/wbg/ - Worldbuilding Thread

I posted this in the GURPS thread, but I think it fits here as well. I'd like some thoughts. It's in very rough early stages.

>A smallish collection of city states similar to ancient Greece, with mountains to one side and semi-arid plains to the other, with the tech-level and aesthetic of the Old West, only they worship a pantheon of seven major gods and dozens of lesser ones (who I intend to base on the Justice League and change them enough that the players don't notice). The deities are like ones IRL, in that they may or may not exist but people don't see them walking around like they might in D&D.

>There are also cultists who will worship strange things beneath the Earth (which is actually a sleeping god that despises humanity, and the things they're worshiping are the manifestations of its hateful fever dreams), who use complex ritual magic. Besides that, the only magic is psionic power.

>A lot of my adventure hooks will be ripped off from western movies and kung fu movies.

So, /wbg/, what are some things you *hate* about fantasy settings, to the point of subverting it in your own creation?

Personally, I loathe the "Spoiled Noble" archetype. Uppity individuals who, ignorant of their own inferiority, talk down to everyone they encounter. Nobles of this type are easily defined as "Sadistic", "Gluttonous", or "Corrupt", and collectively deserve an uprising akin to the French Revolution.
I have this subverted somewhat in my setting by having the only Feudal nation be one of Halflings, with Kingship being an elected position and "landowners" being no different from the mayor of a small town.

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
Many years through various projects. Most were just for one-off D&D campaigns.
>What are your major influences?
TES lore, Wuxia genre, Tolkien, D&D, history, etc.
>Would you want to live in your world?
Nope, not unless I lucked into prodigious doctor who could cure my neurological disorders.
>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most?
I love making cultures, taking a mix of interesting aspects from history, putting them together, and adapting them to the environment and surrounding cultures.
>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the least?
Map-making. I don't do well with committing to scale and I always feel like I'm stifling myself; not giving myself enough room. I like infinite planes but justifying all the alterations to physics is a bitch.
>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
Right now, a homebrew RPG.
>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?
Nothing comes to mind.

Lots of alien races. I went to the point of having no possibility of aliens in my own sci fi setting and having humanity alone in the universe.

The state religion being an organization of assholes.

It's not such a big deal if the religion itself has malignant tenants as long as it's honest about it, but I got very tired of every organized religion being Not!Catholics headed by the Not!Borgia. I just want some sincere believers in my fiction who aren't also podunk idiots.

I'm creating an urban fantasy setting, in which there is a massive city where all the people live.

I'm going to be running a hex crawl through neighborhoods. Give me some cool neighborhoods and their gimmicks.

Inherently good/evil races, monocultures, universal languages, that sort of stuff.

One other annoyance I have is when player characters can go from peasants to having god-like powers and not taking this into account while worldbuilding. It is an observable phenomenon, so regular people should know that bit of "meta" knowledge and it should influence cultures appropriately. Wuxia does this well, but itseems like an exception to the rule compared to other fantasy genres.

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
Don't keep track.
>What are your major influences?
My hopes for franchises before I actually know them, dreams I have, the pixel graphics of old games, Zdenek Burian art (and thus Frazetta too), Morrowind, Dark Projekt, retro art, any fantasy that feels quirky and tailored to it's creator
>Would you want to live in your world?
No.
>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
I like thinking about species in relation to item preferences, clothing, available material and architecture.
Being stuck on stuff I need for other aspects is the worst, builds like a causal tangle.
>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
P&P game
>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?
Less questionaire and more discussion about specific themes. More working out of problems people might have.

I don't think I do too much subversion, I just leave the stuff I hate out.

My usual hatelist:
>cthulhu is tacked on to much stuff again and again, old evil is always cthulhu
>quirk mad science gnomes
>fey/eldrith/seelie/unseelie/faery whatever flavored elves
>races that live ridiculously long
>changelings as race
>anorganic/robot race in fantasy
>elemental planes and elemental templates slapped on stuff
>hypocritical nature romanticism. I hate it when elves or whatever sit in those harmonically organized designer forests and style themselves as nature loving. All while sending attack animal forest friends into a meat grinder.

About your second point - where can I investigate more of wuxia's ideas about that sort of thing? I'd never really considered that sort of thing, except I'd just raising the capabilities of everyone else rather than just having the PCs being demigods by their lonesome.

>What are your major influences?
Evangelion, the Dark Tower series, William Gibson
>Would you want to live in your world?
Hahahahano.
>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
Broad strokes mythbuilding, nitty gritty societal details like currency and resources the most. 'Middle ground stuff' for individual social entities the least.
>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
Originally, a game. Now just because I've got two settings I kind of like and no reason to stop.

I'm writing a modern fantasy secret-world novel. I have three organised factions and one lone wolf sort of group. The organised ones are a secret society run by an emperor from another world who are much larger and well-equipped than the others, a cult made up of people who have a method to use alien technology to basically perform magic, and a weird shadow group of people half stuck in another world who can teleport and magically find things. The loner group can sort of turn into monsters but they're basically autistic so they can't organise. I'm actually pretty happy with how everything is turning out at so far.

Legends of the Wulin, its predecessor Weapons of the Gods, and Qin: The Warring States are a good start as far as RPGs are concerned. Other than that, google the concepts of the wulin and of the jianghu.

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?

About 9 months

>What are your major influences?

( short version) old school science fiction and real history

>Would you want to live in your world?

Depends on where I was, some places wouldn't be too bad.. Other places... Not so much... This world/ Galaxy is a cruel motherfucker

>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most?

I love creating and designing ships, weapons, tactics all the logistics that come with it too.. Making cultures factions and realistic politics is way harder but just as fun for me.

The least? Character creation and dialogue... Fuck i struggle

>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)

I think this might end up being a few novels or a web series
But probably not as i don't show anyone anything.

>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?

Ehh I like these threads but there's hardly any stuff for sci fi so I rarely post.
I do notice a lack of feedback on a lot of posts ( that is actually critique and not hurr Durr your setting is shit ) but it's pretty good usually.

>Those moments when to completely unrelated aspects of your world suddenly meld together into something all-around better are the best part.
That spontaneous cohesion is the best feeling. I've had it happen with "new" aspects combining with stuff that was in the setting for months.

Why don't you like aliens user?

( my setting goes from humans and no aliens to shit loads of aliens very quickly and is how the various factions of humanity respond to not being alone or the biggest fish in the sea )

Okay, so I wanna try something, since it's annoying for people when they show off their work and get no responses:

If you answer one or more questions of this post, you are obligated to comment on at least one other response.

The questions are intentionally vague this time around, I'll try it with more specific ones if this doesn't work. Choose to answer one or multiple, Idc:

>What's your favourite religion/part of a religion/singular deity in your setting? Tell us about it/them!

>What country/region in your setting is the most fleshed out? Tell us a bit about it and it's history!

>Any legends of ancient heroes in your setting? If so, elaborate!

>Simply pick one feature of your setting you think is particularly unique about it and expand on it!

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
dunno exactly. eight years i guess. Current one a little shorter, but i only began really fleshing it out recently

>What are your major influences?
changed over time, nowadays Conan and a lot of similar stuff, the landscape im living in as well as some personal experience

>Would you want to live in your world?
not really.

>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
Map-making and suddenly getting the solution to a problem thats been bothering you for longer. Realising something you fleshed out doesnt make sense in any way is the worst.

>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
a novel. i started one once and it turned out shit because it wasnt really set really good.

>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?
theyre fine really. maybe some more questions

>moomins
i dont know your setting but i like it already.

humans seen as the younger race when compared to others.

tell me more about the urban-fantasyness of your setting, can there be posthumanist banshees with "real-material-prosthetics" to finally integrate into the world they've always been distinct from? Or a neighbourhood of druids that have mechanical nano-machine-plants that use the steel and concrete of the city as material to grow?

How scifi and how fantasy do you wanna go?

Not nearly that high sci-fi. It's more based on scrap technology. The city is always cast in night time, and 'lost' people who end up here can never return.

Most of the fantasy comes from aliens, psychics, and just a general sense of otherworldlyness from just how far from home everybody is.

give me an example neighbourhood. I need to know the parameters

Man have I been fascinated by shrews lately. Going to replace some other generic savage beastfolk humanoid race with shrewfolk with some small changed of course.

>Shrews have sharp, spike-like teeth, not the familiar gnawing front incisor teeth of rodents.
>In general, shrews are terrestrial creatures that forage for seeds, insects, nuts, worms, and a variety of other foods in leaf litter and dense vegetation, but some specialise in climbing trees, living underground, living under snow, or even hunting in water.
>They are very active animals, with voracious appetites. Shrews have unusually high metabolic rates, above that expected in comparable small mammals.
>Shrews are fiercely territorial
>Shrews live 12 to 30 months.
>some species of shrews are venomous.
>some species of shrews use echolocation.

Fucking brutal.

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
Fantasizing about worlds pretty much forever. Trying to create more "proper" worlds half a year or so now.

>What are your major influences?
Hard to say. I guess I could say what I like to read with constructed worlds. Stephen King's Dark Tower, Discworld/Pratchett, Peter Hamilton's Night's Dawn trilogy and the Commonwealth Saga/Void trilogy as well as standard western fantasy clichés. Also, there is one Dutch author (Willem Frederik Hermans) who had some quotes I like (though I do not agree per se)
>What is a hero? Someone whose recklessness has gone unpunished.
>Ideals are the colours of a blind man and the buzzings of a deaf one
>The sole form of joy I know, is thinking of disasters that have yet to befall me.
Also, a teacher described him as "A book with a happy ending is unfinished". I do not necessarily agree with all of these things, but they are striking and befitting of a man writing just after WW2.

>Would you want to live in your world?
The current world I'm creating isn't too shabby, but it's a fantasy setting and I like my tech.

>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
Most: Religions/Cultures
Least: Characters, storylines.

>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
Usually just for fun, but currently I'm -trying- to write a novel. Also for procrastinating on writing, because writing a story is hard, but creating a world is easy/easier.

>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?
The thread was down for like a day and a half reeeeeeee (And I felt too new to make a new one out of fear of messing up)

dagobah.net/flash/pygmyshrew.swf

Sure.

>Waffle District
Named not for its food, but for its shape. The most automobile friendly part of the city, each building surronded by roads on all sides. Most parking is done underneath the buildings, in small parking garages. Stairs criss cross the sides of the building for easy access to the apartments, some of the businesses are four floors up, neon signs jutting out to attract visitors.

>Population
This part of the city is filled with middle class citizens, and there us a huge number of mechanics and chimney - sweeps (gun smiths), as well as urban adventurers.

>Gangs
The Cavaliers are the only motorcycle gang in the city. They paint their bikes like horses and even attack with big silly drift wood lances. Their leader ride a few actual horses when they want to do steal missions. Everyone here is so used to motors the clipping of horse hooves is practically undetectable.

yeah, that's a bit too nondescript to really get the creative juices flowing.

How about a trashed, segregated off district where a meteor hit that's now the center of a cult of alien-worshippers that live there? The "meteor" is a carved, inscribed cube now, but noone knows if that's how it fell down, if that was excavated by the cultists from the stone of the meteor or if they just straight up engraved it themselves.

Mappe. Starting to find myself seduced back to my 4 years back reading of the bronze age so I might try and wedge in more of that theme and mood in this world. Also possibly put a Raoxshani state in Northern Niravahnam a'la Persian/Turkic Mughals.

>HOW LONG
Since the spring or late winter of this year.

>INFLUENCE
Robert E Howard and Harold Lamb, somewhat classical epics, inevitably a slight influence of GRRM but I prefer noble-dark to grim-dark.

>LIVE HERE OR NO
Of other fantasy worlds besides perhaps LOTR - yeah sure. Compared to our world no.

>WHAT YOU HATE. WHAT YOU LOVE
I'm not sure of best or worst but placing political entities on the map and coming up with names within the framework of other names (nothing that sounds the same, avoiding homonym syllables with modern english stuff that you dont' want an association with - basically the "If this name was in elementary school would it be bullied" rule) has been more arduous. When I get a name I settle on I love it and am glad I worked to find it, but until you get that right moment it's a bitch.

>WHAT FOR
Novel and own daydreaming.

>ANY SUGGEST
Like says use the topic to work out problems you have. Rather than just ask for an answer, I have found when I do a post as a kind of 'thinking aloud' I end up solving my issue.

I'm not military but I've always found that sentiment of
>It is the sort of thing that leaves good memories, but you wouldn't want to relive them.
To be endearing and fascinating. I swear it's almost universal among veterans. I think it was on /k/ centuries ago that I heard something like this maxim that has stuck with me. "The first biggest mistake I made was joining the military, the second biggest mistake I made was leaving the military".

I suppose it's a common bittersweet experience for anything you do that takes you away from home and family for extended periods of time, be it travel or military or whatever.

>I like infinite planes but justifying all the alterations to physics is a bitch.
I wouldnt concern myself with that too much. "different universe", "upheld by ancient magic" and "created by the gods" are perfectly valid explanations.

>What country/region in your setting is the most fleshed out? Tell us a bit about it and it's history!

The former Empire of Centredon
It was centered around an isthmus joining two continents and had big posessions on both of them with the north being farmland,steppes and heath and the south being dense forests. Plagues and inner power struggles weakened it and it was attacked by their northern Neerabi neighbours. the final battle resulted in the last known use of magic for centuries, turning the area around the capital into a big swamp.
The clans in the southern part degraded into primitive fighting tribes while the ones in the north were annexed into the Neerabi kingdom, and after a short time integrated with the clanchiefs as nobles. Located directly on the isthmus is the hometown of the clan the story revolves around. They have dug a channel through it and make income by pulling ships through it, although it is a very small trade route. In the last years before the story begins, the high Neerabi nobility develop a disdain for the "southerners" and started heavy taxations as well as excluding them from participation in the kings government, tournaments etc. which ultimately leads to civil war. Despite the South winning it, the Centredonians choose to stay inside the kingdom under a Neerabi dynasty set on the throne by them and their allies, now heavily dominating its politics for a century or so until a new plague accompanied by a wave of fires during a drought fucks them over again.

Except for the Clan capitals there are no major centers of population, most of the land is uninhabited. The cities can get big though, with the one on the Isthmus being one of the biggest in the whole of Neerab.

I like the post-post-apocalyptic feel of it. But I find it hard to follow how tech levels fluctuate - are the southerners still primitive fighting tribes? Was the land as population-center-heavy in the Empire of Centredon as it is now? If not, what happened to all the uninhabited ruins - And in general, what happened to the architecture of Centredon in the south when a more primitive culture took over?

cont.
>Simply pick one feature of your setting you think is particularly unique about it and expand on it!
the process how it happened isnt really worked out (currently im thinking of scientists fiddling with technology affecting reality), but the world is a merger of Earth and another, magic world, with the setting being thousands of years after the cataclysm that joined it and created a new universe with the new world at its center. Technology hasnt evolved back over the medieval level, but some remains of the old world are still visible in human culture - basic hygiene ins some clans or restaurants/bars in cities for rich people as examples.

Clans are also very important in the setting, as they replace the feudal system in some parts of the world. basically a noble family and their subjects form a clan. While most of the clans have a set territory like one given to a king by a noble, they can also be mobile. When a Clans territory gets overpopulated or the family too big, it can separate and form a sub-clan or an entirely new one. Sometimes Clans or parts of them are hired as mercenaries or to settle uninhabited territory by foreign countries, which results in great migrations

>What's your favourite religion/part of a religion/singular deity in your setting? Tell us about it/them!

okay this one's not really fleshed out but I love it nonetheless - So the Kahari subcontinent's based on pre-colonial notions of the savage jungle-folk of India. Everything's jungle with deadly flora and fauna, gigantic beetles to ride around on and savage locals with facepaint and piercings - It's meant to be as metal as possible, and that's why I love their religion:

The world is full of gods at war with each other. Everything has gods - from the abstract concept of joy(although no god has a monopoly on it), to a family, to that particular fork over there, everything has gods, layered on top of the real world is a world crowded with gods.

Gods are unaging but mortal, they die in droves in the unending war of the gods, that is fought at every opportunity. Not only is two armies fighting also the fight of the gods and concepts of the two peoples, the two armies, the communities involved, the weapons involved and a myriade more are fighting and killing each other. Even when a murderer is judged, a god that loves murder is getting killed.

And the corpses pile up towards reconning.

There's the god of life, or rather the god of enduring, of constance, which seeks to keep everything not triving, but lasting. He's the not-change, but as such, he is impotent. Not impotent is the god of death, or rather, of dying, of the fall, of the decomposing. He makes everything grow, everything bloom, so the things can die. He is the become to the other ones simple is.
in the creation myth, the first of those primal gods, the god of constance, lay in balance with himself, until the other, the one of change, clawed out of his guts and formed gods out of them to kill them, and made more and more of them, until their corpses formed the world, and some that could escape the massacre started populating it

id really like to post the maps to explain it better (i have five or so of the same region for different time periods), but im on my laptop right now. I guess explaining things that make perfect sense in my head is pretty hard.

the southerners are still primitive tribes, yes. the Neerabi never felt like pushing beyond the Isthmus would be worth in any way as they could not exert control over the forests in the southern part of Centredon. In preparation of the civil war, the northern Centredonian clans claimed some parts of the south to access the resources they had not, but those were very small conquests.

The southern part also produced wood and coal, both things that Neerab had in excess anyway. The Southern Centredonians built with wood a lot, and as the nation collapsed and the infighting began, i imagine most of the bigger cities just being burnt down in tribal wars with the people retreating to smaller, more hidden settlements.

the architecture in the north is very different, made from stone majorly. Ruins from cities emptied out by plagues exist. In general the "one clan, one city"- constellation was in place also in the Empire period

also thanks for your thoughts!

okay, so my next question would be

a.) what kind of magic was it that turned the capital into swampland and

b.) is there a soiaf-like resurgance of magic going on?

cont.
>Any legends of ancient heroes in your setting? If so, elaborate!
Clans, noble houses, Cities and kingdoms almost always have founding myths.
most of them relate to the period directly after the cataclysm, when modern technology was still around and the humans were trying to rebuilt their world, a united political system (the council of Os Sumane), get along with the new concept of magic and the intelligent beings of the other world called the "others" (which they ultimately genocided or drove behind a magic barrier). Ultimately, Os Sumane collapsed after some time because the old technology failed more and more and it was unable to adapt or keep the humans together (let alone from rebuilding technological capabilities), but it is the "golden age" of humanity in the eyes of the people living way over thousand years later, with lots of place for stories of dragonslayers, people who drove chariots of steel, rode dragons of metal, myths for the foundations of cities captured from the "others" etc..

Hey, are we allowed to specifically discuss languages here?

>a.) what kind of magic was it that turned the capital into swampland and
i havent quite worked on that one, but magic as done by humans is very rare and mostly divine or granted by nature spirits, with only the first kind being able to change a landscape of that size. Both forms take extensive rituals and are mostly forgotten in the part of the world where Centredon and Neerab lie.

>b.) is there a soiaf-like resurgance of magic going on?
no, since a) applies. But when the (northern) Centredonians rebel against Neerab, they are allied with a foreign empire that uses magic rituals.

No, that is unfortunately illegal.

What exactly do you mean? As in, conlangs for your world?

Lolwut

Yeah it's perfectly fine. There's conlang resources in the OP by the way

>>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
For a long while. Years.
>>What are your major influences?
I wouldn't be able to say. Elder Scrolls, Corruption of Champions, pretty much every media I've seen.
>>Would you want to live in your world?
Not at all. Early medieval life is not comfy.
>>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
The small quirks of each culture, and the fantastic architecture/geography. I absolutely hate naming things.
>>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
Just for fun. There's a story set in the world, but there's more fluff about the setting than the actual story.

I absolutely hate the whole "it's Fantasy, I aint gotta explain shit"

>Elder Scrolls, Corruption of Champions
These are not good influences.
>Early medieval life is not comfy.
It is the comfiest. You are a pleb.
>I absolutely hate the whole "it's Fantasy, I aint gotta explain shit"
The plebbiest pleb who ever did pleb.

>These are not good influences.
don't really know anything about CoC, but Elder Scrolls is a great influence

>It is the comfiest. You are a pleb.
oh yeah, I wanna be ground down between Frankish and Saxon kings too. So comfy, especially the whole two wars a year thing.

>The plebbiest pleb who ever did pleb.
eh, I can deal with it both ways

In conclusion: you've got a weird red bulge growing out your head.

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
Probably six years, if not more. Of course, I drop settings a lot of the time. My current setting has been in the works since February, I think.

>What are your major influences?
History, mythology and folklore. Also fantasy novels.

>Would you want to live in your world?
Some of them, I would love to. My current setting is one of them, albeit only certain parts of it.

>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
The most is creating the history of the different countries and kingdoms. The least is geography. I suck at that.

>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
Just for fun, but I intend to use it in a few games.

>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?
I think they're fine as it is. Maybe a bit more interaction, I don't know.

>but Elder Scrolls is a great influence
In lore; it can be. It's overrated, but that doesn't mean it's not good. But as for the games -- they are a great example of how not to execute worldbuilding.

>oh yeah, I wanna be ground down between Frankish and Saxon kings too. So comfy, especially the whole two wars a year thing.
That's what makes it comfy, pleb. A small cottage with a burning fire that lights up all the walls isn't comfy without the endless night outside it.

Plus, in reality, normal people wouldn't be touched by war. Constant low-level warfare is so much better than very occasional WWI level clusterfucks, á la China.

>eh, I can deal with it both ways
Handwaving is bad, yes, but the unexplained is an integral part of fantasy. Science-magic autism is, without fail, boring and contrived. However, you still want to "narratively" explain things, even if not "rationally".

>In lore; it can be. It's overrated, but that doesn't mean it's not good. But as for the games -- they are a great example of how not to execute worldbuilding.
yeah, aight

>That's what makes it comfy, pleb. A small cottage with a burning fire that lights up all the walls isn't comfy without the endless night outside it.

>Plus, in reality, normal people wouldn't be touched by war. Constant low-level warfare is so much better than very occasional WWI level clusterfucks, á la China.

first of all, how does your first thing work with the second? Second of all, you don't have to answer that because the second's not true anyways. The Frankish border wars, the Franko-Saxon wars, the Norman invasion of Britain, the hunnic storm, all of those had a.) very large armies, b.) a lot of looting involved and c.) while mostly not that long periods of constant war, the many, MANY iterations of the same war were by no means "low-level warfare", and China of the early twentieth century isn't the only competition it has in confyness terms.

>first of all, how does your first thing work with the second?
It doesn't -- I'm covering all bases, seeing as we're not talking about the actual late medieval period. If he's going for an extremely realistic take on the period, then the second applies; if he's going for the more mistaken view, or just going for the cool aesthetic (not a bad thing), then the first applies.

>all of those had a.) very large armies
Even Charlemagne never had big armies.

And, both the Normans and the Huns are not from the early medieval period. The Huns are classical, while the Normans are "high" medieval.

Looting was involved, yes, but small armies means relatively small looting. I'm not saying this is a happy peaceful nowadays-equivalent time, I'm saying that it was considerably better for the average person than any other time (when it comes to war), as it was primarily the nobles (and rich) involved in war.

I was not talking about 20th century China, user. Haven't you heard of the Three Kingdoms? Thirty million dead is twice that of the First World War.

>the actual late medieval period
Early medieval period*

As a third party in this discussion, when do armies become big in your opinion then? I'd say the Battle of Tours wasn't exactly a small thing for example.

>when do armies become big in your opinion then
Hundred thousand mark. Fifty thousand mark for "not small". Tours was one of the battles I was thinking of, as it happens.

well the hundred thousand mark in the Europe of Charlemagne, semi-fresh off of the plague would be what, half a percentage of the whole population of Europe in a single battle? Seems a bit high an ask.

Hey, cultural anthropology master's student, back again to try and scrape together answers for you about cultural anthro, archaeology, biological anthropology, and linguistic anthropology (that's in order of most knowledge to least).

Ask me a thing.

How much of an influence is religion on language would you say

How much of an influence is language on religion would you say

That's complicated. I'd say it probably affects etymology more than syntax, for example, and certainly more directly.

Hence "mercurial" coming from Mercury, but no explicit, obvious causal connection between worshiping Jesus and noun-verb sentence structure.

Makes sense I guess. I also have no clue how that doublepost came to be, especially that long apart.

No wait, that wasn't a doublepost but the question inverted, sort of, by someone else. I'm blind.

I've often found the most interesting effect religion has on language to be names. I mean, you've got the obvious stuff like the huge numbers of Mexicans named Jesus or Arabs named Mohammed, but there are a lot of popular names generally seen as secular that have explicitly religious roots worth keeping in mind.

Like you might want to reconsider having a character named Chris (from Christopher, literally "Christ-bearer" or basically "I am a Christian") in a world without Christianity.

It seems like any names that end with El are the name of a biblical angel. Michael, Uriel, Gabriel, Raphael, etc.

What about the other way around, though? Has language had any effect on religion?
Or Mercedes. Means "merciful lady".

>>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
For about half a year

>>What are your major influences?
Popular and less popular movies, series and novels

>>Would you want to live in your world?
Depends where, but in general yes

>>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
+ Allmost limitless creativity
- Must be believable enough for people to get immersed

>>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
A novel

>>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?
Landscape pics my niggas

>Like you might want to reconsider having a character named Chris

If you're making a world based off of our Earth, but there's no Christianity, the argument that the lack of Christianity should mean Chris is an invalid name might hold weight.

If you're making a world with no basis off of our Earth, then the name Chris could have a different origin entirely, and remain as a valid name, despite not holding the "Christ-bearer" meaning that you've associated it with.

>Has language had any effect on religion?
"Logos" being translated into English as "Word" has had a pretty significant effect on the theology of some Protestant denominations. Basically, it reinforces the literal interpretations that many take, which are even more literal than the early Church, because Word in turn is taken to mean the Bible itself. That's why so many people refer to the Bible as the Word.

>"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."
This actually refers to Logos, which is Christ in more traditional Christian theology. But if you didn't know the original translation, it's easy to get "The Bible is God's will on Earth" out of it.

Hence some (not all by any stretch) early Christians (including Origen, who probably would have been sainted by the Orthodox Church were it not for a group of his later followers being deemed heretics) and we're talking < 500 C.E., believing Genesis is a metaphor, but that being seen as a radical new secular idea by many today.

Speaking of "Logos", I've been using Carl Jung's Logos/Eros concepts as the fundamental principles of spellcasting in my setting.

yeah? Do elaborate.

In my setting, "Magic" is the fundamental ruleset of the universe. Creation was built using it, intelligent life formed through it, and it permeates the fabric of reality.

In order to use magic, you need to *be*. All the different types of spellcasters focus on *being* in one way, which allows them to manifest larger and larger effects.
>Wizards *be* through study, using their expanded knowledge to form utility magics and other day-to-day phenomenon.
>Clerics *be* through faith, with the act of belief being shaped into healing the wounded and cleansing disease. Faith could be misplaced, with Death Gods allowing the Cleric to raise undead servants and inflict harm.
Etcetera.

Magic spells can't be cast on their own, and need a "force of will" or "personality" to drive them. This leads into the Logos/Eros concept; magic spells are made up of two contradictory, yet closely related concepts.
>The "Logos" of a spell is called the control phrase, and attempts to define what the spell does. The control phrase is always in a language the caster understands; if they do not have a word to describe something, they cannot manifest it. The Logos is what is recorded in a spellbook.
>Altering the Logos even slightly can completely change a spell's effect.

>The "Eros" of a spell is a mix of the caster's will and imagination. This creates a thoughtform from which the spell manifests.
>Master spellcasters can manipulate the Eros, adding thematics or flashy effects to their spells to confuse adversaries.

It's even possible to write a physical representation of the Logos/Eros in-setting. Doing so is called a Sigil, and is used heavily in magitech and runesmithing.

Forgot to mention, a spellcaster can't manifest anything they can't imagine or put words to. This is why Fire spells are so common, but channeled Electricity or sonic blasts are rare.

What's the difference between sheeps and goats? Why would a farm have both?

sheep: wool, more docile

goats: don't break their fucking legs all the time, can survive in harsher conditions (both are pretty good at that though)

Tfw converting my handwritten shitty writing to a custom alphabet/abugida. Vowels are custom signs above the consonants they follow, with the exception of [i] and [e] if they start a word. In that case they're below the first consonant of the word.

Also, it's not a 1:1 cipher for english. Actually writing a conlang, but still in the very beginning. The whopping 5 symbols I have so far are respectively. I'd post the handwritten stuff, but I have no camera. Filename very relevant.

Also, I believe historically goats were often used to make milk for orphans, since cows are kinda huge and not perhaps the safest around children. Not sure about sheep's milk.

Also, I imagine there's also a similar benefit to not having just one crop. Maybe one year a sheep disease hits town. At leas you still have the goats then.

My magic system is almost identical. Except the base of my system is change (or in universe mu)

Today I just had a horrid realization.
>lowish magic homebrew setting
>rather personal as I wrote a few white inspired short stories following the misadventures of a squire with a embarrassing name
>it's mostly just a playing ground for people who adore the old Knightly legends, classic fantasy, shit like that
>then I stepped back and looked at the world I created...
>based off one of my CKII campaigns
>mega not!HRE that conquered France and dominates the continent, titanic and virtually unbeatable by any who dare challenge them.
>Arthurian England land was first conquered by douchey Normans who were then utterly massacred by blood thirsty Vikings, the crown of the Lady of the Lake now settled on a furrowed brow
>however, the English got tired of Viking black metal and revolted a few decades later. Winning their independence from the Viking menace.
>however the Frenchmen still press their claim, and the Viking-God King wants revenge on the Knightly lands
>all the while with Elves getting put in their place, Dorfs losing ground to molepeople,
>I realized I had just copied Dragon Age
Dammit. Don't you just hate it when that happens? Think you're all unique and shit, only to realize you just unintentionally copied a shittier setting later on.

Not a mercenary company per say but look up Genoese crossbows
Team of 3
Firer shield bearer and loader
The shield was about half a scutum so they could all crouch behind it and not get hit
Best crossbows of the day
But quickly massacred when King of France decided to kill them rather than pay them
And due to the rush of it they didn't have their shields, had worse aim and reloaded slower
And because of that in your campaign you can have different profiles depending on how powerful the players are
I
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Also how many people are using No Man's Sky to help generate their world

By now it's pretty difficult to find something truly "unique" unless you're willing to delve into extreme specifics. It doesn't mean that a concept is bad or anything if it's been done before, and it doesn't mean that the elements you used within that concept (characters, cities, lore, whatnot) aren't "yours". Personally, I think if you're not going to be making something for publication to the masses in some form of media, whether it's "unique" or not doesn't matter too much.

What advantages does No Man's Sky have over other space sims or planet generators? From what I've seen the generation is pretty unrealistic.

'unique' ideas aren't shit, user. it's all in the execution of the idea.

-iel means archangel if I remember correctly so you have
Sataniel
Gabriel
Nathaniel

I thought "-el" means Of God, like Lucifer's pre-rebellion name Helel.

Yep it's unrealistic
>running water on -80c planet
But still it can give a spark that leads to other things, and some animals can make you think of delicacies or daemons in the world

I hate "generic magic". That Warcraft stuff, that has the trappings of a science, and sometimes it's about knowledge, sometimes it's about willpower, sometimes it just is. It's just magic, and then they do whatever with it.

It's not that I'm into the whole "did you think [concept X] was all about [fantasy stereotype Y], you idiot?" thing that has been a staple of fantasy literature for 40 years, but generic magic lacks direction, consistency, and most importantly - effort.

I can deal with Warhammer magic, because it's about sympathetically manipulating the stuff of Chaos based off common connotations. I can deal with Belgariad magic, because it's all about literally forcing your will on reality. I can deal with Harry Potter magic, because it's a children's book and too silly for serious consideration, but I cannot deal with Warcraft magic.

Fucking loved how they did Khadgar in the movie, though.

So in my own setting, I set down strict but broad rules for how the different types of magic work, and built up the trappings of the magic-using "classes" from there.

What's your opinion on ?

I think personally for that angle, I like Spore a bit better than NMS. NMS does vastness very well, but the actual designs are a bit nonsensical, but not a really good kind of nonsensical like the things you'd find in bizarro fairy tales or Junji Ito stuff, but more just "slap A and B together and throw some C in there and it just works" kind of nonsensical.

Spore approaches it the same way but at least some of the creatures don't look as cookie cutter bizarre.

Case in point:
youtube.com/watch?v=RvAwB7ogkik

I still feel sorry for that poor dinosaur who got stuck with antelope legs and a standard bulky body too big for its antelope legs. I watched some LPs when I was deciding whether it was actually worth the price and one line really struck a cord.

"I feel really bad for these creatures, maybe I should just put them out of their misery"

True that. I'm going to avoid what Bioware did to the delightfully retro Thedas seen in DAO, that's for sure. There's no way in hell I'm changing the Jamaican Blonde guys into pale bodybuilders with horns just to make things "unique."

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
Like a week
>What are your major influences?
Books and videogames
>Would you want to live in your world?
Fuck no, world im working on is literally hell
>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
I like making maps, species and characters, coming up with politics is hard because I cant into them
>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
Just for fun right now
>Any suggestions for improving these threads? Anything you would like to see more of (or see at all)?
Free coffee on entry

What do you guys think is the bare minimum that needs to be present for you to say that a setting perfectly captures the dark-fantasy and high-adventure aesthetic of Conan/Hyboria?

While I've read enough to fall in love with the old Conan jazz, I have a bad habit of losing focus of the core theme while worldbuilding unless I can nail it down. What is needed to emulate Conan the Barbarian as a world theme/mood?

Pic related helped while designing a Slavic/Russian fantasy world once.

>How long have you been worldbuilding for?
About six months.

>What are your major influences?
Dune is a big one, along with Alexandre Dumas books, and a general interest in history/economics.

>Would you want to live in your world?
Yes. Provided I wasn't a peasant in one of the crappy countries, it would be a fairly comfy place to live.

>What aspect of worldbuilding do you like the most? The least?
I love pondering international relations in the setting, along with all the plots/conspiracies playing out between its various factions and secret societies. My least favorite part is coming up with names, particularly place names. Like, so much so that it's the main thing keeping me from finishing my map.

>What are you worldbuilding for? (a novel, game, just for fun, etc)
I'd like it to be for a novel, but I don't see myself having the time to actually write it. So mostly for fun at this point.

Guys, what would you consider the comfiest country in the late Renissance? I'm trying to build a kingdom the party should feel relaxed and safe in, and I need inspiration beyond well-patrolled roads, prospering villages and pleasant meadows.

Late Renaissance/Early Modern period includes the 30 Years War so... don't go to Germany.

England