/wbg/ - Worldbuilding General

/wbg/ discord:
discord.gg/ArcSegv

On designing cultures:
frathwiki.com/Dr._Zahir's_Ethnographical_Questionnaire

Mapmaking tutorials:
cartographersguild.com/forumdisplay.php?f=48
www.inkarnate.com

Random Magic Resources/Possible Inspiration:
darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/magic/antiscience.html
buddhas-online.com/mudras.html
sacred-texts.com/index.htm
mega.nz/#F!AE5yjIqB!y7Vdxdb5pbNsi2O3zyq9KQ

Conlanging:
zompist.com/resources/

Sci-fi related links:
futurewarstories.blogspot.ca/
projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/
military-sf.com/

Fantasy world tools:
fantasynamegenerators.com/
donjon.bin.sh/
watabou.itch.io/medieval-fantasy-city-generator

Historical diaries:
eyewitnesstohistory.com/index.html

A collection of worldbuilding resources:
kennethjorgensen.com/worldbuilding/resources

List of books for historians:
reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/books/

Compilation of medieval bestiaries:
bestiary.ca/

Middle ages worldbuilding tools:
www222.pair.com/sjohn/blueroom/demog.htm
qzil.com/kingdom/
lucidphoenix.com/dnd/demo/kingdom.asp
mathemagician.net/Town.html

Other urls found in this thread:

watabou.itch.io/medieval-fantasy-city-generator
experilous.com/1/project/planet-generator/2015-04-07/version-2
www222.pair.com/sjohn/blueroom/demog.htm
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jungian_archetypes#Examples
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Jungian_archetypes
notebook.ai/?referral=2d608906-ee25-4433-8f62-02f55181ba54
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_League)
vulgarlang.com
twitter.com/SFWRedditImages

I accidentally discovered a good technique for creating rivers: make an elevation map out of kitchen foil, then pour some gravy over it.

It's damn well annoying when you're trying to reheat a roast, but it creates perfect rivers and lakes. Stick it on top of your rice/bean landmasses and you're good to go.

Anyone used Dwarf Fortress as a tool to create maps for their worlds?

if there would be a way to watch the world change without races, yes i totally would, it has an erosion system included, and its fucking geographically correct, the dude knows his shit.

I'm considering just loading up a legends save, letting the world generate, and use it as a basis for my world.

I don't suppose anyone got a link with campaign cartographer/city designer 3?

Here's what I'm working on, vaguely following the basic map making in GIMP tut.

watabou.itch.io/medieval-fantasy-city-generator
Useful new tool, I'm in the very early stages of making a city but I need to study medieval cities and professions more.

Does anyone have that one site which lists the ratios of professions there should be in a town?

Add this to the next OP: experilous.com/1/project/planet-generator/2015-04-07/version-2

Why is it these random terrain generators are always so terrible
>presumably generated based on earth geology
>still end up with huge landmasses, like more land than ocean than anything approaching Earths land/sea ratio
>Land masses are always clumped together, not really many distinct continents like on Earth (barring Eurasia)

While I agree that that generator isn't particularly good, having multiple continents isn't the norm for Earth. Continents on the earth go through a cycle of splitting up and then merging back together and supercontinents last a long time. Additionally, ice ages do vary the level of the ocean significantly.

I'm developing a pseudo-Nordic low fantasy iron age setting, cliched, I know, but it fascinates me. Here's my setting's pantheon, do you think I've covered all of the bases?

> Tolkor, King of the Gods, God of Honor
> Yithis, God of the Underworld
> Nuthar, God of the Forge
> Unthir, God of Family
> Burzha, God of Revelry

> Zyanas, Queen of the Gods, Goddess of Beauty
> Mnu, Goddess of Magic
> Furhta, Goddess of Diligence
> Aiata, Goddess of Love
> Vaelyn, Goddess of Nature

www222.pair.com/sjohn/blueroom/demog.htm

Googled "medieval city per capita jobs", first result.

Nothing for weather? That was and still is a very "godly" power we see in the world

Neat, thanks user

storms/sky would work best instead of weather honestly though

Hmm, noted, I hadn't thought of that. Thank you anons.

This comes up every time someone posts a pantheon, but it bears repeating every time.

Don't just think of gods and their domains, that's how you end up with D&D pantheons. Think of the gods a people, with their personalities, motivations, desires and hobbies. Additionally think of their worshipers and their religion. What are the rituals like? Why are they like that? Who worships them? Why do they worship them? What do people ask for? What is the god's attitude towards their worshipers?

In the end, the gods themselves don't matter, what matters is the religion of the people of the land.

>Wanting the world to change without races

The civilizations are functional, they've got nobility and gods, they've even got accurate hamlets and agriculture!

I know, and I agree wholeheartedly with that sentiment. This was just a bare-bones list of the Gods, which exist primarily to allow religion in the setting.

So, I've been wondering. Does anybody here actually answer the entire Dr. Zahir's Ethnographical Questionnaire when worldbuilding?

Are there other such questionnaires or checklists that help with worldbuilding?

I find it helpful to try and fill out the Jungian archetypes: the Great Mother, the Sky Father, the Trickster, etc. They seem to be important to humans on a deep psychological level because they appear in almost every mythology.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jungian_archetypes#Examples
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Jungian_archetypes

Work in progress also my first map I'm putting effort into though I am having trouble filling in the spaces but I do wish to have some flat tall grass areas

I did for one civilization and it really really fleshed things out.

There better be a meteor in the middle of all that because it looks like half a crater

Even if it was a crater most of the meteor would get ejected or vaporized.

Also, something that size should really have a central peak.

>Think of the gods a people, with their personalities, motivations, desires and hobbies
Ehh. The gods should certainly have personalities, but you have to realize that the personalities the gods in ancient myth had were more due to those characteristics being representative of whatever he happened to be god of, and the stories in which the gods interacted with each other was more like dramatizations of real world events -- imagined or not.

But we also have to assume that if the gods in the setting are real, actual beings that they could have personalities outside of their profiles instead of traits being made up because stories were being told about them.

The it's also not gonna ring true.

Obviously true, but also beside the point.

Additionally, if the pantheon is actually an active part of the world and not just imaginary, then they do need personalities and objectives independent of their believer's ideas (unless you're going the route of "belief creates gods," I guess).

Particularly, if the gods actually answer prayers on a regular basis or appear to believes, they need a reason to do so, some objective they want to accomplish. I guess the most classic cliche in this case would be "gods gain power from worship/belief," but plenty of others reasons could exist.

Nice crispy edges, but these kinda maps always got that kinda steep contrast between the deep sea and land..

Also making my own map for fun (because god knows most players don't care) and self reference.

Trying to do a minimalist kinda meme and maybe something simpler and more old style but I dunno what. What do you guys think?

Anybody know what the climate is like at the subpolar lows? What little research I've done into wind patterns and their effect on the climates of their areas has told me areas in subtropical highs tend to be drier, but I can't remember what it was like around subpolar lows and jetstreams as far as moisture goes.

Look into what the Sami people of Scandinavia do and the live through. Northern Siberian peoples do the same

>then they do need personalities and objectives independent of their believer's ideas
Why?

Because the public face you show someone is usually different than the one you show your friends.

So far happy with general layout of this setting, but the names are killing me.

The four red-bordered nations in the West are meant to feel vaguely Slavic (salt of the earth, huge population, divine right, too big to manage, Light vs Dark). The three blue-bordered northern nations are Nordic-inspired (sailors and explorers, fjords, Jarls, runes, viking raids, dragons/eagles). And the two green-border lands are vaguely Celtic (stupid amounts of magic, warring gods and demigods, faeries, the number 3, druids, knife-in-back syndrome).

I have a pretty strong image in my head of what this world's like and what it looks like, but what to call the different kingdoms escapes me. Which baffles me since I have some good name ideas for things that AREN'T countries. Anyone have some good SLav/Nord/Celt kingdom names off the top of their head?

I'll whip together some more setting info if people need more than above.

Here's how I've done it in the past. Name the places in English ("Bountyful land" or "New city" or "Land of the rowers" or something like that) and then look up the translations into a slavic or whatever language of the individual words and then look up the etymology of those words and find something that sounds good and stick it together to get a name.

Alternatively, get one of those neural network name generators and stick in a large list of existing names in your preferred language.

Why would that be true for gods? Why would gods consider their worshippers friends?

You misunderstand. They would show one face to their worshipers and another face to each other, as is convenient or necessary for their plans. It can also go the other way, the gods show behave as they truly are, but the worshipers misunderstand and come up with their own personality. Additionally, worshipers will tend to simplify their personality to a couple of easy to remember traits (as humans do with pretty much everyone they meet) while the actual personality could be much more complex and nuanced. Finally, many gods historically were worshiped under multiple aspects, each one with a different personality and different traits, and we also often known by different names and had slightly different religions in different cultures.

Unless the gods straight up live 24/7 with the people that worship them, I consider it very unlikely that the image their worshipers have of them and how they truly are will be a complete match.

>You misunderstand
No, I'm still asking why. Why is it necessary that gods have hidden plans and characteristics? It seems just as reasonable, if not more so, that the god of oceans, for example, acts like the ocean because the ocean is an extension of him and thus perfectly represents how he is.

I didn't say "hidden plans and characteristics," I said "personalities and objectives." If your gods are going to be actual characters as opposed to forces of nature that never interact with believers, then they need to have a personalities and if they have personalities then they must be doing whatever they're doing for a reason.

Even if, in your example, the ocean perfectly represents how he is, that is an incredibly meaningless description. Humans don't know how the ocean is. They can just try to assign some of their own emotions to it based on their limited knowledge, which could never represent the full complexity of the actual personality.

From a more pragmatic side of things, when worldbuilding a world with active, sapient gods, you need to be able to answer questions for yourself. Questions like: Why does this god care about being worshipped, if at all? What does this god do? Why does this god do what it does? Why doesn't it do something else? Can it do something else if it wanted? Why or why not? What does it want to achieve? What is its endgame, if it has one? How will this god respond to certain events or actions of mortals and other gods? Does this god help its worshipers or does it ignore them? Why? All these questions and many more necessitate for you as a worldbuilder to have a clear idea of the motivations behind a gods actions, the cause and effect relationships that drive it. For sapient beings, one of the motivations is their personality.

You said
>the public face you show someone is usually different than the one you show your friends
>They would show one face to their worshipers and another face to each other, as is convenient or necessary for their plans
This implies that their agendas and characteristics are indeed hidden.

>They can just try to assign some of their own emotions to it based on their limited knowledge
And I'm saying that that interpretation might as well be true. Especially if they have interacted with the god in question and, for example, know that he is usually calm but easily provoked into anger and then become terrifying.

Please read the entirety of the post, since I have addressed all those points.

lol...im reminded of close encounters

>read the entirety of the post
I did.

>I have addressed all those points.
You haven't. All you've done is repeat the same claim over and over again while providing no reason for why it must be as you say.

Unless the gods are the actual main characters of your story players aren't gonna care about how they are as people, and they certainly aren't gonna care about why they want to be worshipped.

>know that he is usually calm but easily provoked into anger and then become terrifying
Actually, let me expand on this point in particular, since this is a good example of what I'm talking about.

This particular snippet is exactly the kind of description that worshiper would come up with, it has no substance and it tells us nothing about the god whatsoever. Like something you'd find written in a holy book and not a description of an actual character.

The questions that come to mind instantly are: What angers him so easily and so much? Why do those particular things anger him? When angry, what is he prone to doing? How does he punish those who anger him? Why does he consider what he does a punishment? Why does he appear to his followers at all? What does he want from them and why does he want any of that?

My point is, if your god is an actual sapient character in your world, then it must have everything a character would have, including motivation.

How do these sound? Adding a little description for each.

Slav
>Zemyna
Far Western nation. Founded by semi-nomads. Always on the lookout for vampires and "cossacks".

>Khalakov
Southern nation. A trading hub, this nation hosts the finest whalers in the world

>Volgan
The huge central nation. This empire is so spread out that a whole system of riders and towers had to be built to keep communication between cities tolerable.

>Nadyven
The easternmost (Slav) country. This nation was founded by a female ruler, and it features exceedingly valuable iron mines and forests.

>Askaer
The lone, northern island nation. This country prefers to tame their monsters in service to their White King.

>Theinn
The eastern, continental nation. This country was once ruled by the Elves. Its knights are some of the finest warriors in the world.

>Svaldor
The island nation in the northeast. This nation is sometimes considered feral by other human kingdoms, only resisting domination through sheer naked savagery.

>Cawdrain
The southern island nation. This country is a rich land for mining, and it boasts a powerful, immortal king.

>Addan
The western coastal nation. This nation is vast and largely untamed. The fey constantly clash with its people.

Worldbuilding is not really about the players. You worldbuild for the GM, and the GM is the one who decides what to put in the game for players to care about. Often times the worldbuilder and the GM happen to be the same person, but it's better to separate it.

If your god makes no appearances in your story and has no influence on your world, then there's no point in fleshing him out, I agree. But if you're god is an active force that does things and has a real impact on the world and its civilization, then you need to flesh out a character at least a little bit so you can have a modicum of consistency and purpose to it all.

Once again returning to the pragmatic side of things. You keep asking why you should flesh out the gods. The reason for that is simple, it's the same reason that you should establish how your magic works and draw out the maps and decide how the races in your world behave and work. It's all going to end up as reference material for when you or somebody else runs a game in the world, and it will help with the most important element of all, consistency.

Why should I flesh out the gods? The answer to that question is: Because I want to have a certain consistency for when I use them for things.

Do the names have any meanings?

I mean, I can say most of them fine and they mostly don't hurt my ears, so that's good.

I tried using words that meant things but, eventually, I figured that the lore of the setting more or less demanded that these were the first ever human kingdoms of their kind unless you count Ragnarok happening only a few centuries before, so most likely they would be named for their actual founders. So I went through a name generator, and twisted whatever names I got from particular languages (Russian, Estonian, Ukrainian, Irish, Scots-Gaelic, Icelandic, etc).

Them not hurting your ears is a very good sign!

>Like something you'd find written in a holy book and not a description of an actual character.
Descriptions of gods never have to be anything but. Even if they are active movers and shakers within the setting a mythological description is far preferable to an actual character description.

Don't confuse what you give the players with what you keep to yourself and the GM for reference.

I have this final North-East section to fill in before I have to worry about a western continent and can be done with geography/international layout.

Originally all those names in white in that north/east were going to be Drythan, which I got from either old Saxon or Gothic. The Drythani were going to be your grab-bag of Germanics in a migration era to early medieval range, some barbars fit for the woods of Teutoburg, some Beowulfs some Charlemagnes. However, I did not like the idea of a single nation (even if mutually unintelligible languages) enhabiting such a huge swathe of land. Color of text and/or glowy border color denotes macro ethnic group - so for instance blue text blue border is Lahiyyans, analogous to Anatolia with an Akhene aristocracy ruling over the Lahiyyan indigenous folk except with the tribes of Kulawar and Arsiya.

-I have about four untapped macro-cultural groups I can use in that empty space. Celtic, Slavic, Germanic, Norse. This refers to the names I use, the synopsis sense of a culture and aesthetics. One of those I need to use for the "Swiss Elves" tenatively titled the Myreykr. Dwell in the NE mountains, winged. So I have three to mess with for humans. for the empty painted spots (where the names aren't over colored splotches).

Idea 1: Drythan homeland is the currently empty plains east of the Rruvasa (Scytho-Saka-Sarmatians) where Hythrane is. In last few centuries, migration led across the mountains, ejecting the Arazalids (mimicry of the fall of the Western Roman Empire). Some migrated eastward - the Bjari, the Strodur, one or two more and the Rhonath being the vanguard. Pushed Celtic style Skulani/Cnerah/Aelendar/Yhir/Beothrun to the peripheries.

(cont)

The GM doesn't need anything beyond that either though.

Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. That's up to the GM to decide.

Oh so now we're moving goalposts?

No. What are you even on about?

Worth noting the focus I want to pursue in the writing is away from this region. It's closer to the Raoxshanid-Innaki (the teal cities)-Harbanu (the sky blue in desert names)-Raqqan region. But I need a sense of the full world before I do so.

Idea 2: Drythan homeland is the Fahrja-Ufhausja region & Leikr islands. Migration was more southward down the straits. They inhabit the Fahrja/Drausja/Thaurban/Reiksdar region, crossing over to Uthberen but not over the river. The mountains and plains (might be forested) where Hythrane and Ufhausja are were not penetrated because they were poor as shit and are inhabited by Slav-Thracian types who are the more Teutoberg barbarous barbars while the Drythans are the civilized Charlemagnes. Drythans who stayed behind might have some of that more norsey feel. Drythans continued to expand eastward into Arazala continent, stopping either by that river the Aelendarii are next to or the Rhonath vanguard idea from before.

Idea 3: Drythans are originally from the Islands north of Cnerah and Myreykr. Swept down across the plains of Rhonath, through the river valleys after failing to breach Arazala (or the hillfolk of Ishuna). Filter across the sea, inhabit the plains on the east of that mountain. Dunno who inhabits west of those mountains, probably the Slavo-Thracians.

Think I'll do #2. Still a bit of a quandary where do I go name wise with the Swiss-elves. Could be they had a civilizing influence on the non-Drythans living southeast of them so they just share common names, in which case it's Celtic. Could do the more distinct Gaelic/Scottish for the Myreykr and the Gallic/proto-celtic for the lowlanders.

Kind of also like the idea of a "Western Europeans enclave in the 'mid east'" and might figure out where a Galatian style migration could happen.

Pardon the brainstorming spam, found it helps to write this out in the topic when I am stumped.

We started with and then moved on to and , all the way to . All of which state the personalities and goals of the gods have to be flesehd out enough to be actual character descriptions.

There's no "it's totally up to the world builder/GM to decide is this is actually necessary or not" to be read in there at all.

Holy shit, are you for real? Do you honestly believe I'm telling you that you must do something as if it were a law? I am giving a fucking suggestion, it is implied that it's up to you to decide if you want to follow it or not. I'm honestly having a hard time following your thought process now. All I'm saying that fleshing out the gods will improve the quality of the world. If you don't consider it necessary, then by all means, don't do it.

Also: is entirely unrelated to the whole discussion, all I'm saying there is that it is up to the GM if he wants to use the descriptions of the gods in his campaign or not.

>Do you honestly believe I'm telling you that you must do something
Yes, because you totally said so yourself.
>then they do need personalities and objectives independent of their believer's ideas
For example.

Read up a bit on Proto-Indo-European religion, because that's the one many real world religions stem from. With admixtures from whatever local faiths existed in the lands Indo-Europeans settled, of course

Man, I though I was talking to an adult. I'm not going to qualify my opinion with "this is my opinion" every time I post something because that's fucking implied.

You're totally free to put whatever you want in your world, I am merely offering suggestions on how to improve it, but you don't have to follow anything. I'm not going to report you to the worldbuilding police and have them lock you away if you build a subpar world, so calm down.

Russkie here. Let the nitpicking commence!

>Khalakov
Sounds suspiciously like a slavic last name
>Volgan
That's just Volga with an extra letter

>Cawdrain
What does it drain, again?

To be more serious, the names are fine as is, except for that last one

notebook.ai/?referral=2d608906-ee25-4433-8f62-02f55181ba54

Notebook.ai is a great way to store, organize, and finish your notes, just so you all know.

>I'm not going to qualify my opinion with "this is my opinion"
Considering that what people argued with you over was that there's no reason that what you said needs to be the case and you responded by repeating that it is necessary, you not stating that it's not opinion is the least of your worries. You're simply unclear to the point of saying something entirely different than what you think you're saying (or at least what you right now claim you were trying to say).

>if you build a subpar world
I'd actually argue that your suggestions is exactly what leads to one creating a subpar world.

>two autists are duking it out again
Makes the thread so lively.

>Kind of also like the idea of a "Western Europeans enclave in the 'mid east'"
DEUS VULT

So I tend to make settings with a very small amount of countries in them. Is this a fatal flaw of mine or just a difference in world building strategy?

There have been very popular fantasy worlds with a very small amount of nations. There are also some popular ones with a load of them.

Now if you are aiming to depict a more realistic take on decentralization, what I'll call the Crusader Kings angle, yes a small amount is not good. If you are aiming to tell more of a personal story and adventure and not a geopolitical one then a small amount is fine. LOTR had more than just Rohan and Gondor but really those two were the only ones of major consequence in the original trilogy. I like the Demon cycle series but it pretty much just has something like three polities at the start with some villages in between them.

>Western Europeans enclave in the 'mid east'
Sounds more like Crusader states to me, which were much more complex than DUES VULT
But the rest of the setting sounds Iron Agey, so I'm not sure what would be a more appropriate analogy

Look man, arguing with you farther is pointless, so I'm going to stop here, because you refuse to read or answer my arguments and instead insist that I'm merely repeating stuff.

>You're simply unclear to the point of saying something entirely different than what you think you're saying
I am perfectly clear and consistent with what I am saying. What I am saying is this: "If your gods are going to have a significant presence in your world, fleshing them out will lead to more consistent and purposeful actions on the part which will overall contribute to the quality of the world. However, if you don't plan to use your gods as anything but flavor, it's fine to leave as vague descriptions. Additionally, after you're done with your fleshed out gods, you keep the information as reference for you and the GM, which the GM might choose to use or not, for that is up to him."

I literally cannot get any clearer.

>I'd actually argue that your suggestions is exactly what leads to one creating a subpar world.
You could argue that making sure that rivers flow downhill makes for a subpar world for all I care. Doesn't make you right.

It depends on what your goal is. If you just want a simple setting to play a few games in, then no. It's not a flaw, it's probably exactly what you want to create.

If your goal is to create a realistic and naturalistic world, however, then yeah, you probably want to look into that.

>If your goal is to create a realistic and naturalistic world
What do you mean by this? I'm currently writing in it for a story but it only centers around one nation that is far away from most of the other ones
I guess I'm more so falling into the trap of classifying things as regions rather than nations if that makes sense. Generalization and oversimplification are my downfall I think.

>I guess I'm more so falling into the trap of classifying things as regions rather than nations if that makes sense
I might be misunderstanding you but that's not an incorrect way of viewing real world places, especially through history. Look, for example, at Germany, India or China. There were multiple cultures, ethnicities and nations existing at the same time, intermixing, dying and living again

Also I recommend just having a smaller part of the world depicted on your map with the rest vaguely existing off-screen. I personally do not like something super minimalist like demon cycle or Sanctuary of Diablo but


I'm going for that kind of Hyboria "prehistoric up to medieval" angle, though I'm willing to go further - the Ghozarids variously can be cast as Mughalesque (if I were to write from the perspective of a Babur, perhaps the epononymous founder Ghoza) or may end up Kushan/Saka style if they adopt the religion of the Niravahni as Kushan did Buddhism. I may have a Raoxshanid kind of marrying the idea of the Safavid Ismail (1500s) and Alexander the Great.

A pre-medieval idea for europeans in the east is the Galatians, the Celts who migrated over and maintained enough of a distinct Celtic identity for at least a hundred years but may have for well over 200. Had these Drythans civilized by succeeding lost Arazala (vaguely Roman but I like Hittite/Trojan or Etruscan aesthetics) those who continued and settled in some arid wastes of the center (Targumat going south) analogous to the Mid-East could have remained more 'barbarous'.

Targumat itself was kind of "I need something to fill in this spot", and instead of a Mitanni-Hurrian style "Indo-Euro horse lords (sans chariots) ruling over Innaki (Semites)" it could become Galatian/Outremer. But I still have to overlay along that map what I was imagining as a dominant but crumbling Assyro-Babylonian empire based on Nakkar. Some of the map is political (Niravahnam, Arazala), other parts are more ethnic (much of the Raoxshani might be ruled by Nakkar).

I was more so talking about nations and countries than ethnicity and cultures but I see your point.
Thanks, I can definitely try that. I have several places that are just large regions of "there are a lot of different nations here". There are only like 3-4 big countries that I have defined outside of those.

Astarian Model 181 Service Autorevolver,

While the Astarians had been seeking a new service sidearm since before the war began, the outset of war in 179 delayed the project for nearly a year and a half as all available production was turned towards existing designs. As more capacity became available, two new pistol designs were considered, both comparing directly to the Model 166 Double-Action currently in use as the primary sidearm of the Army, Sky Force, and Aerotroopers. Two radical new designs were produced - a so called "Automatic Pistol" designed by Stone Eagle Armory, which used a spring to push new rounds into place, coupled with a "slide" which ejected spent casings and pushed new rounds into the chamber, and the Autorevolver produced by Kiralhe Arsenal. The autorevolver was a more familiar, mechanically simpler design than the Automatic, with the unique departure of being recoil operated. This lead to a much lighter trigger pull than the Model 166. While it held less rounds than the Automatic, the Automatic was prone to jamming as unburnt black powder and fouling built up in its mechanisms. The Autorevolver was also able to accept the same rounds and even the same six-round speedloaders as the 166, enormously simplifying the wartime logistics chain.

Sorry I forgot to finish at my point here but more to your remark about 'regions rather than nations'.

What I recommend is try to figure out the macro-ethnicities or macro-nations, leave the micro or sub-nations left unsaid until they are important or relevant to the story. To use my world for an example the colors are coding to the macro-ethnic group. "Mazhran" is a macro ethnic group and equivalent to "Berber". "Raoxshanid" is macro ethnic and is equivalent to "Iranian" (pre-modern). Agezza and Imujjha are sub-nations equivalent to the Masmuda or Zenata Berber confederacy. Pahokan is a sub-nation equivalent to Pashtun, Svarya to Persian and Arzoda to Median.

Imagine you're telling a story of the Peloponnesian War. The macro-ethnicity of "Greeks" is too broad. You need sub-nations - Ionian and Dorian is too broad, so go deeper - Athenian, Spartan.

Imagine you're telling a story of Tarquin Superbus and the Roman overthrow of the kings. "Roman" is too broad of a category. You have to either go down to the level of Roman vs Ardean, Arician, Laviniumi (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_League) or down further to the level of individual roman families.

>What do you mean by this?
A naturalistic world would be one that reasonably could exist given the circumstances. For example, GRRM's Westeros is not a naturalistic world; it explicitly only exists for GRRM to tell his story within and the laws of it confirm to whatever the plot needs at the moment.

Tolkien's Middle-Earth could be said to be somewhere between a naturalistic and artistic world. It doesn't serve as a vehicle for the story, but rather the story simply takes place within it. It was created more to please Tolkien's own sensibilities and artistic urges, though he used many naturalistic approaches in creating it.

Now reverse it. Imagine you're telling a story of Alexander the great. Tribes/families (outside of the Macedonians) is much too specific for his greek levies. Even cities is a little bit more specific than it needs to be. This is a drama on an international stage - unless you bring something highly specific (Thessalian cavalry) nobody gives a shit if you are Athenian or Corinthian or Argive. Now the macro ethnic title with exceptions is the scale: It's Greeks, Thessalian exception, Macedonians (with exceptions of more emphasis on their sub-factions), Illyrians, Thracians, Medes, Persians, Bactrians, Saka.

So in your setting do what you said , "there are a lot of different nations here" because they are not relevant to the main story and you do not need to document every little thing. If they become relevant you will introduce the reader to a sub-faction. The 3-4 big countries get more attention to the sub-factions.

So it sounds like you're doing good.

A setting with a few extremely well-defined countries will often feel bigger to the players/reader than a setting with hundreds of countries with little detail.

As long as you're putting in the work then you should be fine.

Thanks user! I guess that works if the names sound like real names.

Cawdrain and Adda were mistyped. I meant to list those two as Celtic, as well as the Nordic names. Oops!

Fill it with random villages, the World isn't filled with only capitals.

For creating names I change the syllables places or/and change letters like G to K or R to L and vice versa.

On the topic of creating names, I found the below link on /r/conlangs, thought it was neat.

vulgarlang.com

>vulgarlang.com
This is too autistic for me, but it is pretty cool.

Rivers basically never split like that to make a land mass large enough for a city

It's not nearly autistic enough, actually. Some of the phonological rules it makes up on its own are seemingly completely random.

I like the way my current world is coming along, but at the moment I only have humans fleshed out, and it feels weird to just throw in "thar be elves in them woods" and "thar be dwarves in them hills"

How do I put fantasy races in my setting without them being cliché and forced?

Monthly map-post

Beginning some early work on the western continent and various work all over

How the FUCK do I come up with artificial gravity that isn't centrifugal?

How did you make your map?

there are multiple online generators that use S John's work) and others') that do a nice job, one even names the inns and populates them.
'Medieval Demographics'

Depends on what you're going for. By fantasy races, do you mean THE fantasy races, or just races that don't exist in real life?

I have my own methods but I am going for a more specific sort of setting, I make my own races which are meant to be biological and not magical. That fits my setting and I could give you some tips for it, but that might not be what you are looking for.

Generally I would advise strongly against the "my elves are inca and my dwarves are greek" style. It ends up feeling very shallow, arbitrary, and inorganic.

paintNET, cursor drawn. A few parts were randomly generated through donjon and then edited to match the aesthetic, while other areas were generated and I haven't touched them up yet.

19 layers although only 5 are used in that pic, the other 14 are personal references like elevation/religion/etc. The 5 layers you see are water, water shine (the gradient), land, labels, and "sunglasses" which is a transparent black layer placed over the land and water to make the whole thing darker.

map of areas that were originally random-generated

>How do I put fantasy races in my setting without them being cliché and forced?
Do you actually have some interesting ideas for fantasy races?
Do you have some specific needs or functions those races are to perform or represent symbolically in your world?

If the answer to both of these questions is "no", then you can't really. I'd say don't even bother. If your answer is going to be "no, but I still insist that I have more races in my world outside of humans", then just go back to the questions and think hard about them until you can answer them with yes.

I feel like the world fits nicely without dwarves/elves/etc, but I'm worried it'll be stale with just humans

Well, really world is humans only and I would not call it stale. It's only "stale" if you can't flesh out the humans enough. In the end, it's actually almost ALWAYS culture that drives interesting stories and fascinating tales, not racial gimmicks.

A bigger problem might be that your audience (what ever audience do you wish to create for) might demand fantasy races out of principle, because it's a genre staple and some people can't get by without them.


Fantasy races really make sense only in one of two scenarios: if you want to make a speculative fantasy (which itself is a really fucking weird thing to do, since fantasy is usually based on mythological perspective, and mythological and speculative just does not work together very well) and you really just want to play around with the good old "what if" question.
Like "what if I had a race that only eats rocks and everything organic is toxic to them?". Or "what if a mage wanted to create a perfect warrior race by crossing humans with honey badgers, but the specimens escaped into the wild"? Or "what if Gods wanted to create a race whose job is to consistently oversee the balance of dead and living souls in the world?" or something silly like that.

The other reason is because you want to create some sort of symbolism. That is how Tolkien did it. Hobbits to represent the homely, but potentially stale and self-centered "small minded" middle class people. Elves to represent the ideals of faded past. Orks to represent corruption. And so on and so forth. All of those races exist to play a symbolic role in the grand narrative, aspects of human mentality as Tolkien saw it at the time, driving principles of sentiments of the world.

If you don't currently have particular ideas for either of these paths, I would not worry about it, just skipped non-human races all together, and focused on flashing out the human societies.

What's a better idea for magical realm but also biologically realistic Dryads:

- they're just trees (or really big flowers) that evolved flowers that look like humanoid women, and they spread their pollen though men using those flowers as an onahole, getting covered in pollen in the process, and subsequently spreading them around [needs a reason why they can't just use insects or the wind like everyone else]

- they are trees whose fruit contain highly addictive hallucinogens that make human/elven women stick around them, and also makes them horny for reasons [needs a purpose too—maybe so they can defend the tree against some animal that would otherwise damage it]

- they are parasites of some kind whose life cycle involves both mammals and trees; they have some crucial beneficial effects for the trees (like how fungi at tree roots share nutrients with them), so the trees co-evolved to produce fruit that nourish the infected humans so the parasite can flourish

- a combination of the last two