/wbg/ - World Building General and Fantasy Cartography

Not enough space to work with

Could an ocean just be filled with countless tiny islands rather than big continents?

It looks gorgeous though

I guess it should have some underlying logic, like, the islands would be the highest points of the tectonic plates.

I had two large continents on one side and wondered if I should fill the superocean with tiny islands like in the pacific

It would make for an interesting history dynamic

>What are the principal religions in your world?

>The central setting of my world is a weird-ass bronze age/early iron age empire ruled by an immortal god-king, venerated as the Forger of Civilization, who brought the lands of the empire out of a shitty dark age ruled by warlords and sorcerers. He achieved immortality by basically becoming a cyborg. Not really a god, just worshiped as such. His death is what sets the current era in motion (civil war, etc all that fun shit).

There are other gods, but none as kickass as God-Emperor.

Do you have an aesthetics for said God-Emperor?

What I find most difficult is making the continents follow a logic of tectonic plates dispersion from a single Pangea. Any advice?

more or less just a very tall dude who looks like somebody dipped him in bronze, with some crystal bits here and there for eyes and shit. nothing real out there.

Haven't gotten much around naming things unfortunately. At least anything that sticks.

It would be really interesting. I kinda wanted to go with sort of fragmented world, but it did end quite generic in the end.

Wow, loved it. What software did you use? My guess is you have an intuos.

Really fucking shit.

I just scan pencil and paper drawings. Or use Hexographer, depending on my needs. So much easier, and so much better looking.
You don't need to, unless you're doing it for fun.

>You don't need to, unless you're doing it for fun.

Partly for fun, partly for autism.

God got pissed people were jacking it in the streets like savages, shook the world like a magic 8ball that owed him money.

I need a name for the main religion of the continent replacing Europe-Russia. Pretty much like Christianism but very imperial. Monotheistic. A little fascistoid.

I've been working on this for a minute.

They're floating islands in the sky.

Gosh, that's the wrong one. It's got partial labels. This one is without. Still need to finish labels.

>Christianism
Christianity my dude.

And it'll depend on a lot of information which we don't know, like how it was founded, what its observable characteristics are, what super special theology it adheres to that others (supposedly) don't...

My problem with this is that I can't see a continent dynamic beneath it (tectonic plates migration)

That's a bit hard since none of us speak the languages of your setting. Religions tend to be named for a central figure (deity, prophet etc) or a concept that sums up the basic philosophy of the faith.

Either works, but something in the the vein of Buddhism or Christianity is easier since you just bolt on a suffix to the divinity/messenger.

Rate, not finished, mountains are next.

5/10. Has a certain charm of simplicity.

I agree with the other user, the background does not work in favor of readability

Christianity comes from christos, which means "anointed one" in Greek. I was thinking that I can come up with some word which sounds good and say it comes from whatever classic tongue the alternative world has.

What's the name of your Christ?

Chad

I guess that's as good as it can get. Will try to make it look less like it was made with paint.

That's the point. The name has to mean something in the classic language. It is not necessary to come up with said language, only with some words that sound like coming from the same "classic" tongue.

>>Christianism

My bad. South America here.

I prefer Photoshop. Just make some random shapes until you have a map of a world's plates, and then extrapolate mountains and sea beds from there.

Koskeaj looks like a dick

Not as much as the Democratic Frenatsche.

Indeed, and shows that titles/epithets/euphemisms as well as the "true" name of the divinity for this purpose (Buddha is also a title signifying Awakening, while Zoroastrianism is called after the personal name of the prophet).

So there are two things to decide. Firstly is what does the name mean in the old tongue? Some titles are fairly generic (Illuminated One, Creator Spirit, Allfather), others are more tied to a specific theology (Ascended One doesn't fit for a primordial being).

The second is the language. Creating a complete or even partial conlang is not required, but what sort of sounds are you going for? Russian or Greek to match the inspiration, Black Speech to ram home that these are not nice people or something else entirely?

Once you know those things you can start messing about with sounds in a more structured way than stringing random letters together.

What is a good way to classify different biomes?

I need an opinion on this

Inkarnate/10

Hey, this is neat. I had to modify this one to fix the Mercator projection, but I already like it!

Thinking of a Late Antiquity game now. Have the players start as civilians and auxiliaries in Not-Britain just after the legions either all die, disappear, or simply leave to fight down south in a Civil War.

Konigs-Thing sounds like a king named it after his penis.

Other than that, eh it gets the job done.

>/wbg/ - World Building General and Fantasy Cartography

No Drawings or anything ground-breaking to report as I was busy selling prints at a local comic-convention, but:

I like to classify and order my monsters (in a smiliar fashion as monster hunter does) to the best of my ability in order to make them feel more "naturalized" and I've thought up a new family: "Scaled Horses."

Scaled Horses include: Unicorns, Pegasi, Kirin, Kelpie, Questing Beasts, and the Catoblepas. The idea is they're all related, but in the same way the Bovidae family is composed of sheep, goats, antelope, wildebeasts, and cattle.

Thoughts? Opinions? Additions? (Always looking for new monsters)
Maybe a better more official name than "Scaled Horses" that I could have for the naturalists within my setting?

Squamos Equinae
t.pseudo latin pro

PaintTool SAI, drawn by hand. And yeah, I got Intuos4 Medium.

The world is fairly divided religiously, a lot of it being pagan cults the elves are fairly tolerant of their subject's belief's and leave them be so long as they pay annual tribute

Or Squamae
Skameus
Skamelea
something like that

Please!!!
Respond to this post! !!!!
thank You

>Squamos Equinae

I like it, I'll use it.
T.Hanks, user.

This the gold standard, which primarily works on temperature and moisture which in turn determine plant life.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Köppen_climate_classification

This is how you take a map and place biomes where it makes sense, although it is a fair bit of work and not everyone wants that level of detail.

cartographersguild.com/showthread.php?t=27118

That's pretty nice thanks, but is there any nicer name for the climates? Like if the players ask, "what the fuck is Cfc" I won't just tell them, "it's a temperate climate without dry seasons and with a cold summer".
I was going more for "Highlands", "Desert", "Grasslands" "Dense Forest" "Jungle" and that kind of stuff

Cold and wet grass and forest is a fairly snappy descriptor.

However you may also want to scroll down to the bottom of this wiki page for the Biographic Regionalisations box.

Of course muggins here forgets to include the link.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biome

>muggins

How long could the earth survive without the sun?

like 5 minutes idk

From: popsci.com/node/204957

"If you put a steamy cup of coffee in the refrigerator, it wouldn't immediately turn cold. Likewise, if the sun simply "turned off" (which is actually physically impossible), the Earth would stay warm—at least compared with the space surrounding it—for a few million years. But we surface dwellers would feel the chill much sooner than that.

Within a week, the average global surface temperature would drop below 0°F. In a year, it would dip to –100°. The top layers of the oceans would freeze over, but in an apocalyptic irony, that ice would insulate the deep water below and prevent the oceans from freezing solid for hundreds of thousands of years. Millions of years after that, our planet would reach a stable –400°, the temperature at which the heat radiating from the planet's core would equal the heat that the Earth radiates into space, explains David Stevenson, a professor of planetary science at the California Institute of Technology.

Although some microorganisms living in the Earth's crust would survive, the majority of life would enjoy only a brief post-sun existence. Photosynthesis would halt immediately, and most plants would die in a few weeks. Large trees, however, could survive for several decades, thanks to slow metabolism and substantial sugar stores. With the food chain's bottom tier knocked out, most animals would die off quickly, but scavengers picking over the dead remains could last until the cold killed them.

Humans could live in submarines in the deepest and warmest parts of the ocean, but a more attractive option might be nuclear- or geothermal-powered habitats. One good place to camp out: Iceland. The island nation already heats 87 percent of its homes using geothermal energy, and, says astronomy professor Eric Blackman of the University of Rochester, people could continue harnessing volcanic heat for hundreds of years.

"Of course, the sun doesn't merely heat the Earth; it also keeps the planet in orbit. If its mass suddenly disappeared (this is equally impossible, by the way), the planet would fly off, like a ball swung on a string and suddenly let go."

So, not long.

How much is too much for a low magic setting? I've been adding some extinct animals here and there and have even let them replace a few animals

Extinct, as in real animals that no longer live on Earth? I barely count that as fantasy, let alone magic.

I guess I was talking more about within the theme of, though maybe I'm just confining myself to cliches

does this make ANY fucking sense

dice+1d20

just wanted to show some appreciation for Kakhabad from the old Sorcery! books by Steve Jackson

>Shamutanti Hills - unforgiving wilds
>Khare - walled city filled with traps and intrigue
>The Baklands - huge arid wasteland, with 7 elemental serpents rushing to warn the fortress of your arrival
>Mampang Fortress - the home of evil, nestled high in the Zanzunu peaks, where The Crown of Kings is being kept

what a journey, what good books! do you think this sort of journey would work well with Burning Wheel?

Can't tell where the equator is.

pic related

Hm. Basically all of your red and blue arrows should be reversed or swap positions. At least, how I would have done it.

That's quite neat, thanks user.

I don't like how it looks and think gimp or photoshop will give much better results.

Speaking of religion, I could use some input or just the chance to write this out and see if I can jog my memory. I am drafting the initial concepts of various religions and I have a solid premise for two, but the third I am struggling on.

The first is conceptually a martyrdom/sacrifice cult, but sacrifice made consensual. Theological underpining is the primordial serpent-creator killing itself to bring about life. It vaunts those Bodhisattva types who sacrifice themselves on behalf of a cause: the guru ascetic who starves himself to death, a wife who dies in childbirth, a martyr on the battlefield, seppuku. Like Jainism or Theravada Buddhism or Hinduism the expectations of the non-elect are less severe and sacrifice is simply a matter of struggle and hardship for the whole. Belief (or possibly somewhat reality) that the sacrifices of those elect do something beneficial for their community. If figurative it's the bodhisattva, if literal it might be bringing martyrdom brings deluges of rain, invigorates flagging spirits and weary limbs and heals wounds of a besieged city.

Second is conceptually Thothian Logos-ism. Influence of Christian monasticism with the Jewish "a faith living among strangers". Almighty God is a creator whose spoken and sung and written word lies behind creation. Understanding of the divine language in as close a human analog as is possible allows for magic of a more classical sense (no fireballs or maelstroms). All good.

Third becomes trickier. Ideally opposed to the first, likely also monotheistic or closer to monotheism as I am less a fan of polytheism. Will continue next post.

I like the shape and look of the islands minus dick island. But I am generally opposed to island worlds with lots of narrow islands. It's something I often see in these fantasy maps made by individuals (not big name fantasy worlds) and I think they don't consider the ramifications that island worlds would have climatically and culturally.

However, it's not impossible tectonically - at least it's not impossible with a layperson sense of "does this world look believable or does this world look ridiculous fantasy (Where you have a skull shaped island or maelstroms and shit). Most will just assume the island has a SHIT ton of water, the ice caps are very melted and so the water level is super high.

To help scale I'd just try to make sure you have some thicc continents or thicc islands.

As long as you avoid a map looking unrealistic riduclous fantasy (skull island, ect) just a vague sense of tectonic believablity works. No need for going down to Pangea levels, just make sure mountains look like they formed from tectonics. Or are old and weathered enough that nobody remembers wtf they came from (Carpathians and Urals).

Some great terrible god stretched ecuador, stole the D and replaced it with a T.

Those are water patterns, right? That's always confused me but I don't recall them switching directions (counterclockwise or clcokwise) most of the time except for counterclock south of equator, clockwise north of it.

There are exceptions but I do not see those exeptions in our world at the equator. West of Equator mark in South America you see it immediately turn into a clockwise spin after it passes the equator (if not just going straight across to Indonesia)

IT's a really tough thing to gauge so I don't think there is anything wrong with it.

Wind patterns though I am like 90% sure they never reverse except with monsoons. So it's always clockwise or always counterclockwise

What's an Ecuatqr?
Is it anything like the Equator?

Sorry I posted wind, not water.

Adding for third one. I like Zoroastrianism, this faith would at the very least be practiced by my Raoxshanid Iranians, perhaps some of their Indo-brethren (who may have turned to the martyr cult instead), could expand to include any number of other European-inspired folk but also likely Semitic Innaki and berber-inspired Mazhrani. While I like a religious war angle I'm not aiming to just do a complete fantasy repeat of the crusades on an ethnic level. I like the Zoroastrian idea of every man and every soul being a battlefield in the cosmic struggle of good and evil, it's dislike of gnostic hostility to the material world in favor of spiritual purity.

Fire religions are so utterly cliche, though. Especially with Dark souls and ASOIAF's popularization of fire faith. And while such a martial faith lends itself to cavalier horse-lords it hardly offers a compelling faith compared to the interesting hooks of self-sacrifice and martyrdom or knowledge and wisdom being the truest manifestation of God.

I considered the Christian sense of rebirth with symbolism of the phoenix and sol invictus. Maybe less in the sense of Christ's sacrifice for man (which cuts into the martyrdom faith) but rather just the immortality of resurrection. Likewise if the original prophets were from an equestrian wide-outdoors folk I could see sky and thunder taking hold. Water and a goddess is rarely ever considered and has an Iranian parallel in Anahita, but I'd need to think about how to embellish that kind of supreme goddess past the usual bit of fertility and purity. Can only take fremen water-worship so far.

Assuming warm-bloodedness, would having scales instead of skin affect clothing material/style?

I have like 2 days to finish a world
Do i try to detail every culture and place a little bit or should i put all of my efforts where I think the players are going to be?

Put all your effort where you are going to put the players. If I'm playing I won't care how the Elves from the fuckstain mountains half way across the world shit, if its not going to impact my game.

>A thing (Old Norse, Old English and Icelandic: þing; Norwegian, Danish and Swedish: ting; German: Ding; Dutch: ding) was the governing assembly of a Northern Germanic society, made up of the free people of the community presided over by lawspeakers. Its meeting-place was called a thingstead.

Königsding would probably be more appropriate, but it certainly doesn't need to refer to a dick.

Absolutely not. Practice bottom-up worldbuilding.

Start with the city or town your players will start in, and then work your way outward. Even then, this is pretty difficult to pull off well in just two days.

Are scales less sensitive than mammalian skin? Would scaled creatures be okay with wearing very coarse materials?

>I have like 2 days to finish a world
Rip off something obscure.

I'm playing around with the idea of a world that is basically an infinite plane.

What would be a sensible explanation for a sun and moon rising and falling every day and night? Do they lower into massive holes in the earth?

Is there a scorched or even glassed wasteland for untold miles around the sun-tunnel? Is there a frozen, dead wasteland outside of the sun's sphere of influence?

Or is the sun a sort of mystical illusion that only appears to sink into the earth?

Is there a more compelling option?

As long as you're fine with some terrain features (like the Sahara or the Central Asian steppes) never appearing, sure.

You could even make the ocean have hyperbolic (instead of flat or spherical) geometry. That way, not only is your world infinite, there's more of it the further you go and you can never have a full "world map", only local maps.

None of your seas flow out to the ocean.
All of your rivers which do flow to the ocean have multiple outlets branching way before you reach their deltas.

I know it's fantasy, but seriously ... At least have some geographic diversity even as you forgo verisimilitude.

I've said this before, but when you throw logic and reality out the window, you don't really have to explain things. A simple solution could just be that the sun and the moon exists in a different dimension, another plane of existence, or something. There's qutie a number of ways to go about it, but as I said, since you completely disregard for logic and reality when you are creating your infinite plane, there is really no reason for you to explain why things work the way they do.

The lake feeding out into the desert is cool though.
This probably happens in every desert but in Death Valley there's a river which flows in from the mountains and just fucking stops because it all evaporates. It's where the salt flats come from.

The sun is infinitely high up and infinitely bright on half its face and another kind of infinitely bright on its other half, and rotates.

That guy that made the map here: I know that "Ding" would be more appropriate, but think that "Thing" just sounds better, especially since that this is for german speakers and "Ding" has the same meaning as "thing" in english.

I was too lazy for deltas. Or rather they aren't high on my priority list

Nuclear war happens, Japan is untouched, but has a military coup and begins annexing Indonesian Islands and Philippines for oil; does this make sense or not?

>Nuclear war happens
>anyone ever does anything again
Nope.

Eh. If a sun appears to rise over a plane, players might be inclined to make a quest out of discovering where goes and where it comes from.

Looking for the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow, so to speak.

That's possible, but a stationary, rotating sun presents some unique challenges.

The sun's trajectory is very helpful in the absence of a compass, and wilderness exploration often comes up in my games.

Just use Þing. You already have umlauts, why not go full Germanic?

Japan has a big shortage of a lot of natural resources, not just oil. For example, iron. It would need to invade China or Australia as well to secure those.

The sun is 15 degrees "north." Millennia of astrological data evince its moving moving to the horizon at about one degree every 1500 years.