/wbg/ - Worldbuilding General

Is there any advantage of a third eye? Speaking strictly about biology.

Depends on how high or low it is from the ground. Of course, you could always bullshit and say it's heated by magic if your setting lets you do that.

Food is going to be a tough one. Unless magic or vertical farming is used, they'll have to be constantly trading for food.

It's roughly the size of Kazakhstan, and I was thinking about having it move very slowly latitudinally around the globe

Higher than Mount Everest, most of the time, and now that I'm making some research I think heating and air supply will have to be done with magic either a tree of life or a crystal of life

Depends. If it's a hunting creature, I'd say no, because binocular vision is already fine and an extra eye adds nothing but more brain mass requirement. If it's an herbivore, however, I'd say a third eye would be useful, as it allows the other two to be even further to the side, allowing for an even wider field of view.

I hoped that EVEN MORE binocular vision would somehow enhance something. But thanks.

Tell me about folk heroes in your settings, /wbg/.

'Sunspot' a MAVERICCCCCK pilot type that lost his squad in the battle of Mare Imbrium on the Moon. Almost singlehandedly saved a port city site there from bombardment by machine ships.

Does the floating continent float in tandem to the surface world, ie. does it move or appear ''stuck'' in the air?

Note that there is something to be said for more eyes - insects and arachnids do it and they're two of the most successful animal groups ever - but simply tacking on more eyes to a chordate probably won't do you much good. Chordate eyes have developed very specifically to do their jobs, and there's a reason there are no chordates with more than two. Adding another eye (or two) means you have to increase the brain mass that is used to process visual information, possibly exponentially, and this likely cancels out the benefits of extra eyes, even for grazing animals. For example, horses don't have a third eye, even though they've got a huge blind spot right in front of their face, because the costs of a third eye outweigh the benefits. For another example, owls, instead of having eyes on the backs of their heads or whatever, developed the (anatomically astounding) ability to turn their heads 180 degrees, because adding extra eyes just isn't feasible for chordates. Insects and arachnids get away with it because their eyes produce less information, their inputs can be aggregated in the case of compound eyes, and they don't need to do much visual processing anyway. Of course, this is your fantasy, so you can do what you like, but consider if there's a better way to achieve what you're going for rather than adding extra eyes.

A semi-divine being who comes cyclically to restore the link to the higher planes that corrupted individuals of secret societies obfuscate thanks to the Black Barrier to weaken the people of the lands and make them slaves.
When he comes he devastates everything and thus is also known as "The Great Destroyer" but it is seen as a blessing because it is.

Some reptiles have perietal eyes, but these are for hormone regulation and can only sense light.

It moves very slowly

>no detailed treecocks

are you even worldbuilding

...

So I'm still looking for feedback on a setting I posted a quick synopses here.

>no leaves for maximum photosynthesis

0/10, get the weed killer

maybe their chemosynthetic.

Rolan the Plunderer. He used to be a sailor, working on merchant ship. Once his ship got caught up in a storm and most of the crew died and he found himself in the capital of the ancient empire overrun by zombies. He wandered inland a bit and found lots of treasures (And not much of zombies). When he returned home, he was one of the richest men in the world. He spent some time travelling and collected a lot of information on various nations, then he bought some land and settled down for a bit as a noble.

He eventually decided to travel again, looking for a way to pass into mystical land beyond the mountain range to the North. What he found instead was so terrible apparently, that he returned home, fell ill and died.

Posting this map for a couple reasons:
1: I always like hearing what people think
2: I need more in depth political situations in case the party runs off the rails and hitches a carraige.
3: I want thoughts on what I've worked out thus far.

So, the campaign is going to be typical dungeon-delving, but with a backdrop of c. 1550's politcal maneuvering. Particularly, the party is going to be working in the HAE for the petty lords, probably trying to locate an ancient ruin rumored to have Ancient Weapons {read, Automatic Laser Weapondry}.

HAE politics is easy to fit into a campaign, given the weakness of the imperial crown. Most of the dukes hate each other, and they only really stick together out of a mixture of propriety and fear that Karne might start marching troops through the mountains. It's a hot spot for ancient ruins, science, and magic, so even though the setting as a whole is generally short on the huge D&D level magics, it's not implausible that one of the party had such an education. {CONT}

{CONT}
If the party decides to be murderhobos or otherwise villainous, the Emperor has a group of 12 official badasses (the settings only "Paladins", although they don't have the cleric/fighter mixture of classic pallies) who are basically Adventurer Detectives who are hand chosen by the fat man in a big chair.

If they do decide to go evil though, they can be hidden by a lord, potentially. I don't like railroading, so they happen to be nearby a duchess who just so happens to be a very powerful Lich/Blackguard.

If they decide to go off the rails and head north, there's some interest in the Gunpowder Trade and the "Bay of the Thumb", which Woodmother currently dominates. That has some interest in bucking tradition in that the dwarves of Kathudum and the elves of Woodmother trade a lot (Gunpowder for Banana and Lime, mostly) and are real good friends, which pisses off Karne. The party may decide to help the elf/dwarf alliance or the Karnians in deciding who the dwarves trade their good powder to.

I don't know about east though. Porcia and the other orcish countries are based off the far east, but I don't know what the party may do over there. Same for north or west of Kathudum; The dwarves do fight with the goblins of Choco Madar a lot (It's why their northern cities have a significant subterranean presence, but they generally have things well in hand. Should I give the gobbos a Ghengis Khan?

As far as Dakhest, I've decided the only way they'll find a ship there is if they agree to hunt a Grootslang. That probably won't turn out well, leaving them stranded in Lizard Mali. Is that a good idea?

I've been working on the setting since middle school but I've only recently been tooling it for a campaign, so help would be appreciated.

The map is really angular and linear. You should add more variation to the coastlines and borders in certain areas.

hey /wbg/, anyone care to comment? colors are a mix of terrain and elevation.

Right now the main comment I have is that you could try to re work your color palette, which I know may seem a bit rude to say but will help a lot with your map if you keep to a consistent group of colors.

I would personally suggest checking out other maps for what they use to get an idea of what I'm talking about, but for example I'm not sure if its something special to the map but the purple/pink area in the center of the map and the really bright yellows around the southern coastline are really jarring, and redwhite fuzzy pattern seems strange in my opinion.

Other than that the actual shape of the map itself is interesting, there's deinitely a lot to explore. The river system that pretty much splites the northern and southern portion of teh continent would be a hotspot for civilization I think, its much like the Mississippi or the Colorado in scale.

Rolled 7, 16, 17, 17, 1, 9, 15, 18 = 100 (8d25)

Might as well give this a whirl

Meanwhile, have a map of australia done up in fantasy style

That map is really cool.

I like the worldbuilding here, but what if you wanted to make an actual game around your setting? Where would you go for help in making mechanics and getting advice and commentary on your game?

rollan

(i don't actually play tabletop games but /agdg/ doesn't talk about worldbuilding or writing much at all)

Rolled 10, 21, 7, 7, 24, 15, 1, 15, 23, 6, 15, 6, 8, 5, 24, 25 = 212 (16d25)

aww shit i fucked up

Rolled 12, 22, 5, 22, 5, 25, 22, 4 = 117 (8d25)

ayy rerolling for the other two civs i rolled

i'm making a vidya and on Veeky Forums there's an ameteur game dev general and an RPG maker general

i don't think that's what you meant, though

Looks like a wolf's head. Is it called Wolfshead Isle?

thanks for your honesty, man. i know that some of the colors don't make a whole lot of sense, but they're only a temporary fix until i have the time to flesh out the terrain more (pic related). the pink, for instance, is a stand in for a complex system of canyons and badlands that i haven't fully conceptualized yet. but if you have an example for a good color code palette to use, i'd love it if you hit me up with it.

it's more of a continent than an isle, really, but that's not a bad idea of where to start thinking up a name for it

Bump.

Uh are you making a full video game or are you talking about like a TTRPG game?

map status: progress

Not really sure about the whole circles of various sizes thing, especially between major and minor cities.

*nudges u*

...

How do outsiders settle a frontier full of nomadic horsemen including mounted archers?

they do it as their tech outperforms horsemen. see russian campaigns against the central asian hordes in 16th and 17th centuries

This is certainly the easiest way, another example would be the American West. However there is more too it than just guns and weight of numbers. Let's assume a pre-blackpowder setting and see what they can do.

To start with most of the steppe/desert is useless to anyone not a pastoralist. So you don't actually want to settle the vast sea of grass/scrub, instead you stick to the rivers as that is where agriculture is possible and because they provide lines of communication.

You fortify everything. Unless you have the misfortune to time your colonisation with the rise of Ghengis Khan, nomads are internally divided and mostly raid rather than conquer. Good defenses deter, can hold off small raids and buy time for reinforcements in large raids.

At this stage the most likely model is that an Imperial government is the one who set the steppe settlement policy, and the plan is construct a set of giant fortress cities at key points and station field armies to respond to problems. It's very costly to set up, but hopefully the rich farmland/mines/whatever can justify the expense in coin and blood.

By the time settlement happens, the back of the nomad threat should already be broken and powerful tribes/confederations either destroyed, crippled or bought off- at least in the area of settlement. Horse archers are not invincible and many cultures have held nomads at bay, we just tend to focus on the times when the nomads won big which warps perspective a bit.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expansion_of_Russia_1500–1800

For a medieval example, the Sassanids founded a number of fortress cities to capture ground in the endless conflict with nomads in Central Asia.

I think it looks fine.

The major/minor icons are nice, I'm not a fan of the capital icon though. Maybe you could do a pattern or insignia inside of a major icon for the capitals.

Whose that map?

How horribly wrong can settling a steppe go against united tribesmen?

I mean. It depends on how bad the losers feel about genocide.

In case a major incident that divides a faction into two happens, do you prefer it to be something huge from the get go like wh40k or something subtle or even petty that snowballed because of incomprehensions and circumstances.

If you were to write a book about cultures in your world (a fluff/supplement style book, not an actual book) what would you include for each culture and how would you format it?

IMO, breaking it down into major categories and then smaller ones seems like the best format
>Culture (Culture Name)
>Everyday Life (Major Category)
>Food and Drink (Minor Category)
and here would go food/drink

The issue is, though that formatting isn't exactly donut steel-levels of innovative and works pretty much anywhere, I have no idea what would go into the rest.

I am gonna go look at those 100+ question culture questionaires and fill out the format, but I was hoping for /wbg/'s opinions on the most important aspects of a culture.

=)

The way I see it, a culture is any group of people who identify with each other and habe a belief in their superiority to everyone they identify as being separate. The important bits to show, in my opinion, would be how and why they developed these beliefs and how they act upon them.

If you use that as a guide, it's not too hard. You need history, their current dealings with those astound them, and aspects of their culture that THEY take pride in (ie, the little things they believe price their superiority, be it how they dress or what they eat).

For example, Jews and Muslims not eating pig. This taboo helps separate them from other culture groups, and since their reasoning is that pig is unlean, bit eating pig while others do makes them feel superior. It matters to them, and so should be included.

there are some good discussions & resources on this archived thread: boards.fireden.net/tg/thread/43898547/#43903962

i would say language families, social class markers, household structure and major natural resources in their land would be pretty major signifiers

I'm talking about a TTRPG game.

Land enclosure and wiping out the herds of grazing animals that the nomads rely on for food.

Those are both great posts (in that i'm gonna use them) but I think my biggest issue right now is the categories

What would you consider to be the most fundamental aspects of society? i.e. "Everyday Life" could theoretically be one as it covers: commoners, food/drink, life in a town/city/village, etc. But does "military" warrant its own category, or should it be a part of government/politics/every day lie? And so on

The second one. A conflict of personal stakes suddenly blowing out of proportion is great to get players/readers invested.

You are living a common life in the last setting you worked on.

Suddenly, the entire Dwemer race from the Elder Scrolls appear in your world. How fucked are you?

The entire world is doomed. Someone capable of casting an elder scrolls fireball would instantly be the most physically powerful individual in the world.

What system?

yeah, the capital icon isn't great

i'll probably do the insignia idea or something eventually

Unless they escape and somehow survive in the lifeless, demon infested parts of the desert or are demons themselves everyone in my setting is pretty fucked.

none

Just find a way to stop them from being united, duh. You can't have a stable form of government based on steppe tribes, all nomadic empires either relied on settled people's state structures or were unsophisticated confederations with no state building tools and therefore unable to pose a threat let alone react properly and united against outsiders outside of excepcional situations (like the rise of a charismatic leader or a great famine that causes big migrations)

tl;dr nomads are actually shit and only can win against settled when the settled are having times of troubles

Okay, then what's your setting's magic like where a ES fireball is so powerful?

Groot, the last treebender

I like 2nd better but I don't care much. The important thing for great internal divisions is that there's not a single conflict between to groups, but actually several groups with several conflicting objectives that start allying and/or killing each other when the thing that kept them from infighting disappears. All interesting civil wars have not two teams but two sides each composed of several teams.

I'm fucked as everyone is because I don't like high powerlevels and I prefer settings withare no pre-industrial tech.

>so never mind why or how the thing is floating
This a big mistake
At least; you, need to know why/how.

Rivers seem reversed.
They should start as one then split into many.
And it looks Australia sized, as in, your world could fit another 5 of these. Maybe it's just not to scale. (obviously not, that's not what I mean with scale)
>Blaland
heh
too boxxyy/squared
Looks like Tolkien made those mountains.

Mass effect, is that you?
Too humanoid.

I think the Huns and Mongols do not agree with this statement.

Hey it's star shaped!
I see what you're doing!

Huns collapsed as soon as Attila died.
Mongol empire split/collapsed (a decade) after Djengis died.
Sure they were in alliance still, but less so than what EU is now.

It split after Mongke died

Re: Conlanging -

There are probably only two people on this board who can relate, but I wanted to make a Hawaiian-based conlang for my [thematically Polynesian culture], so I spent a good chunk of time this afternoon studying Hawaiian grammar and a Hawaiian dictionary.

Man, those dudes sure love reduplication. e.g. ha'ule=to fall, ha'ule'ule=to far very far/further, or kalawa=curve, kalawalawa=crooked (curved too far), etc.

The grammar is a little cool in some areas (noun gender is based on if you can create them/own them, tense is adding a common suffix) and dumb in others (45 common personal pronouns, all your prefixes/suffixes are 1-3 characters so it all sounds the same). Then you get into weird lexicon distinctions (a normal pool of water vs a pool of water used to catch eels). Will probably take a while to finish my conlang based on it, may end up just stealing the easy parts of Japanese and English.

Anyone also working on a conlang?

Point still remains that "only" a strong ruler can hold a large multicultural society together.

>conlang
Unless you're a linguist.
Just copy the syntax of one language, "morphophonology" of another, then make up your own alphabet.

Meh. I'm less concerned with the practical applications of creating a language (or worldbuilding in general) and more interested in what it enables me to learn (linguistics/geology/sociology/history/etc). In this context I'm fine with having something more complex, exposes the weird quirks of various languages and the potential for similar outlets.

>Oils and greases that can be used to coat blades of brittle metals like mithril to strengthen them and prevent tarnishing
>After years of training through self-induced psychosis, some people can vaguely dream the past and future, however most people who attempt this fall into insanity and permanently lose the ability, reliable users are very rare and probably wouldn't be shown, only mentioned
>Microscopic organisms that can be introduced to human blood, promoting the immune system, metabolism, and wound regeneration of their host
>Vampiric version of the latter, which mutates within the host over time and whenever it is spread, most mutations are malignant and make the vampire weaker and more monstrous
A gun would easily kill most of the greatest warriors and vampires, a TES fireball is even greater than a gunshot.

They literally do. In several points. Do you know anything about them beyond mapblobs and horse archer memes?

The mongols were actually a kinda succesful empire, good example for hata I was saying about nomads being shit except in very specific situations. They belong to the group that relies on settled peoples having troubled times to become a threat and relying on settled peoples to have a working state. They also had the exceptional event of several charismatic rulers.

Or just copy a unique aspect of a language group you like, then just make everything up without any real coherency as long as its sound is "flowing".

Like reduplication, that's actually pretty interesting yet simple way of making an entire language of just words with meaning, then all forms of inflection is just extreme reduplication.

"Heavy" means heavy, and there's no other word to describe weight. "He-heavy" means heavier "heavy-vy" means lighter... But how heavy?
"He-heavy horse" > "Heavier than a horse"
But obviously not mountain heavy, cause then you'd say something bigger than a horse, horses have an absolute size and weight.
"stone-one-ne." > "many small stones"
This would also make translation difficult.
Like in that star trek TNG episode with a culture that spoke in abstractions.
If you have no idea what a horse is you have no idea what fucking size or weight he's talking about.

something something this was fun
Maybe I'm just full of shit.
I know nothing about Hawaiian grammar.

>TFW not smart enough to invent a language.

Well, say what you want about CrashCourse.
The Mongols were the exception.
But exceptions don't make the rules.

Exactly.

> "Name" human, sa-sand-and, hand, wea-weapon.
>A lot of humans greater in number than the grains of sand in a hand (an exaggeration), from "name" (or just at that place), with not just weapons but great weapons.

With your own vocabulary ofc.

I did a bit of conlang for my fae realm, but it's mostly kept to topography, names and surnames. In fact they use a different, non-developed language/s when not naming important things.

Since we're talking about conlangs what is/are your favorite word/s in one of the languages of your setting? What does it mean?

Not my lang, but I've always loved the name Carcharoth from Tolkien, which basically meant Jaws. Such a great werewolf name.

>tfw when you realize your underground setting is gonna need a fucking 3D map

This is gonna kill me. Are there any tutorials on how to do this? I might just say fuck it and make layers of flat maps, but even that is gonna be really difficult to sketch out.

It's a pain, but just do it like the blueprints of a multi-floor building.

Or make a model.

No it doesn't

Honestly, I might just say fuck it and not bother with a full world map. The setting is primarily geared towards exploration and adventure on the frontier, so it might be better to make stuff up as I go along and only have a map of the more charted areas.

...