/wbg/ - World Building General

How about combining this and your original idea by having: twigs/pebbles/feathers/nests where the first three are components of the final once accumulated.

How do you guys feel about wings and tails?

>should wings be functional?
>should winged creatures fly with magic instead?
>how would flight change a culture, architecture, life in general?
>what would other races think about a race with tails and/or wings?
>what races have tails and/or wings in your world?

>>should wings be functional?
>>should winged creatures fly with magic instead?
At that point why bother giving them wings at all? Or do you mean like tiny vestigal wings?

>how would flight change a culture, architecture, life in general?
Wide streets, open buildings, better temperature control (assuming flight uses a lot of energy/produces heat)
They'll probably eat a fuck ton because of it
>what would other races think about a race with tails and/or wings?
Lynch them by sawing off their wings

I mean do the wings literally provide lift or is magic aiding them? Do they even need to flap them? That's sort of the question. Most fantasy winged creatures seem to have wings that are actually too small.

Depends on the world user. Low/no magic just give them the ability to glide like pic related or just make up some air/helium bladder bullshittery. High magic, why not

>should wings be functional?
Only on small races.
>should winged creatures fly with magic instead?
No.
>how would flight change a culture, architecture, life in general?
It depends on how ubiquitous or easy/ accurate this flight is. I imagine far more open architectural designs, with openings in ceilings and plenty of room for wingspans. War would be far more skirmish-based, and emphasize speed and maneuverability. Imagine WW1 dogfighting, or neolithic combat.
>what would other races think about a race with tails and/or wings?
It depends a lot.
>what races have tails and/or wings in your world?
I like tails popping up once in a while on more bestial races. Wings are 90% vestigial, especially for larger races like Dragonborn whose sheer weight and density wouldn't allow it. I do have a race in a psionic-heavy sailing setting called the Aeolans, who are a small saurian-avian race with working wings. Said wings allow for gliding, but are actually better suited to swimming. Pic related.

>should wings be functional?
While the usual answer would be yes, it is interesting to consider uses for wings when the wings can't be used to fly. Maybe the race has colorful, ornate, showy wing that while useless for flight are put to use in dazzling displays of dance and artistry. The creatures could puff up and spread their brightly colored wings in a defensive display to drive off predators or rivals. Maybe the race overheats easily in their hot native environment, and they beat their blood-vessel rich wings to stay cool. The same could go for a cool-climate race which open their vessel rich wings in the sun to warm up. You could also have half functional wings that cannot sustain the creature in the air, but can aid in increasing the distance of jumps or improve climbing ability like in WAIR.
( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wing-assisted_incline_running )

>Depends on the world user.

Yea that's kind of the point of the thread

>Aeolans
Tell me more

They are a small, raptor-like species that evolved on small, rocky islands either out in the ocean or a little ways from shore (though they faced competition from seagulls and seals there). They recently made the jump to Sapient and started using stone tools to help hunt fish. Their mightiest technological feat made on their own was a bone tipped spear.

Sailors started picking them up while stopping at their island, mostly for food, but eventually as a cheap source of deck slaves. Aeolans thought this was fantastic, as they got to leave their shitty island and see the world. They also got shinies. They like shinies. Aeolans are now (only a few centuries after beginning their stone age) a regular sight in ports all over the world, often hawking cheap trinkets and mugging tourists. Their "culture" (a hodgepodge of everyone else's culture seeing as how they never had time to make one themselves) is highly materialistic, focusing on Wealth as a measure of...well, everything that matters. Some still worship The Old Faith, but do little more than donate to the priests stuck back home.

Aeolan society operates like a pyramid scheme, or the traditional depictions of a mob, thieves guild, or criminal enterprise. They realized they had few advantages against other races, basically being sneaky, stabby, and speedy, so taking on everyone else's thieving and espionage needs was the perfect niche for them.

>What is the greatest accomplishment of a current civilisation in your setting?
Three things which are all interwoven with one another and have set Carska on the path to becoming the world's first true superpower since the days of myth. The discovery of gunpowder, the beginnings of industrialization, and the growing field of magitech.

Especially after the particularly bloody and nightmarish Unification Crisis in which they forcefully absorbed a neighboring theocracy, the sheer force of Carska's military seems a weapon that few would be able to resist. The Protectorate's current obsession with finding a rare magical material that's said to power most of Carska's magitech has its gaze on the New World, while the cloak and dagger in-fighting between various magisters likewise hinders any single path forward.

What are the "playable races" of your world? Are there lesser races? How do you categorize your races?

Theoretically, if designed for an RPG, you'd have humans, Ogres, Goblins, Dwarves, Gnolls, and the Sobki, big crocodilemen. Elves would work best as an NPC race.

For "lesser" races, there's the Akarikkao, a Skeksis-inspired bird race that hasn't been fully developed yet, and some goatmen Satyrs that live in the mountains.

>What is the greatest accomplishment of either a current of fallen civilisation in you setting?
Creating near immortal and extremely powerful telepathic super beings who arguably were indeed the ultimate final step in human evolution
>What are the ramifications of this?
Plunging the entire world into a desperate war that would have ended in the genocide of all humanity if they hadn't nuked themselves in a desperate "hey, only a few of us surviving is better than none of us surviving" bid, reducing humanity to forest dwelling clans struggling to simply stay relevant two millennia later

Hello!

Despite the crudeness of this section of map, do these mountains and rivers pass the 'initial glance' test, or are there any exceptionally glaring issues?

Each pixel in this drawing is about 5 sq. miles (decreasing with increasing latitude) and the north-south distance pictured is around 3,0000 miles (for scale)

thanks :)

No lakes?

Rivers are completely and utterly fucked backwards. Rivers flow into each other as they travel towards the ocean. Rivers can rarely split before the ocean, but you’ve gone nuts in that regard.

What kind of historical heroes does your setting have?

I quite literally had it backwards--I thought I remembered someone saying the opposite and went with it

it's been nearly two years since i did anything /wbg/ related

anything terribly wrong with the mountains?

good point, ill start thinking about that

>mountains
Not necessarily. Seems okay.

Mountains don't normally split like how your map looks but it's not really an issue.

Take the Rockies/Andes ranges since they're somewhat similar in length. Both are relatively straight. Andes are coastal mountains so not much of a problem either.

Came across this as the finale music from Rogue One hit its crescendo.
I shed a solitary tear for the loss of this brave hero

There's so many rivers, I would honestly just tone the numbers down a lot. And the central river netword coming out of the east of your mountain range just end in the middle of the continent, when typically rivers empty out in seas. Rarely they can lead to underground aquifers, but rarely.

pic related

dunno what to do about lakes

Nice, what are the 3 black lines?

latitude, 15 30 and 45

just forgot to turn the layer off

That's a pretty big scale, you could throw a couple larger lakes along the path of the rivers and imagine some smaller ones scattered among them too.

awesome, i'll do that

gonna play some games with friends for a bit, but afterwards i'm gonna figure out what's going on east of the range then add some lakes

Sup /wbg/. I've wanted to give a shot at worldbuilding for quite some time and I feel like this might be a good time as any, so I figured I should start out with something not as compilcated as building an entire world from scratch.
I settled on making a fantastic version of modern day Earth, which is an idea I've been nurturing for quite some time (way before that atrocious trainwreck of a film named Bright was even thought of), and I have already started to flesh out how the races originated, the impact of gods and demons on mankind, how magic works and the historical and cultural impact of all these things on modern society, while also keeping it somewhat historically accurate. The thing is, where do I go from here? I'm fairly new at this and I would appreciate help.

And by the way, lakes can be pretty complicated and messy. Here's a screenshot of a map of Manitoba. As you can see there are some big lakes connected by rivers that lead to Hudson's Bay. But the more you zoom in the more little lakes you find all over the place. I think some were left by glaciers?

Not all lakes are fed by rivers necessarily, some might be supplied purely by rainfall or groundwater flow (groundwater makes up ~20% of the world's fresh water don't cha know!).

forgot pic

haha i remember flying from western US to québec

it was just a bunch of green and water, never seen that before!

Canada is fucking full of lakes. I can't count how many times we were told as schoolchildren that we have about 20% of the entire world's fresh water. When you annex us during the resource wars, pretty pls don't take all of it.

Hm. Is this in the southern hemisphere? Like, top line is 15? Or is that the bottom?

northern, bottom = 15 and so on

Alright. So if I'm reading your map correctly, everything East of the mountains should be a bone dry desert, especially around 30. The Western side of the mountains would be *slightly* better, but not much. The southern half of the range would get more rain on the western side, and would be very European in climate. The semi-peninsula/island in the west would be very green, especially on the eastern side.

this isn't how i'm gonna show terrain (probably gonna create a standardized set of colors corresponding specifically and unambiguously to each terrain type) but

>pic related ?

(ignore the bit of the island to the south, just got caught by brush tool)

According to what I know, that looks alright. You'll have to alter the rivers a bit (remove some from the desert, add some to the green bits, etc), but I think it looks good now.

You choose to either go from top down or bottom up, and stick to it. If you want to have things stick to somewhat known history but still have magic then you should figure out exactly what impacts magic actually has since magic is basically the key element that makes a major difference from what it sounds like.

From there on you can just start by building something for like a campaign or something, even if you don't end up using it as such. Flesh out characters, organizations, motivations and such until you're satisfied with what you have to work with.

awesome, thanks again

is the major river (The one with the tributaries) ok to stay for oasis/trade purposes? otherwise i like the dynamic of all the fertile land next to the big, barren wastes

>remove some from the desert
Are you trying to suggest that deserts do not have rivers? A thin fertile strip extending a mile or two from a mighty river like the nile doesn't make the regon as a whole any less desert.

Two large drainage basins in the central desert is totally fine and will be very important when he gets around to placing cultures later

You have a fair point.

Keep the big one.

so, pic related is the region i think i'd like to focus on to any extent beyond "there are people here"

the island in the northwest corner is part of a larger thing in which i'll probably copy greenland

the mounds of white on the bottom of the screen are part of a larger continent

the inland sea extends a bit further to the southwest

i don't want to take up too much of your time, but do you have any basic ideas as to where mountains would fit/what biomes any of these areas would be off a glance?

thanks again for everything, seriously

>What is the greatest accomplishment of either a current of fallen civilisation in you setting?
I guess greatest accomplishment of human race's now fallen first civilization was to wipe out a previous dominant race, commit so many atrocities in the process that normally neutral god of fire and death decided to wipe them all out with a sea of fire, and then have that god almost killed.

>What are the ramifications of this?
Some old races generally view humans as dangerous psychopaths, last few remnants of the wiped out race are doing their beast to bring humanity down, a major god has been asleep for a thousand years, and without him the world is crawling with undead. Oh, and if the god ever wakes up, he'll be super-pissed.

>how would flight change a culture, architecture, life in general?
A FUCKING LOT

my setting was originally designed as replacement for WHFB when it died (it moved away from that though), so there's plenty of "playable" races in wargame terms

overall, the major races present on most continents and often interacting with each other are
Humans (including a few new skin colors)
Ogres (WHFB style, but often smarter)
Elves
Dwarfs
Lionfolk
Minotaurs
Goblins

Orcs, Ratmen, Lizardmen, Snake People, Undead, Daemons, Deep Ones and Beastmen are present in large numbers too, but they are more of an external/internal threat always.

>Are there lesser races?
Yes, plenty. Many are just lesser spirits that took flesh, others are cast away creations of older more powerful races, a few once ruled the planet but were exterminated almost to extinction and live out their days in remote corners of the world.
These include Gnoles (Dunsany style), Goldskins, Jayith, and many others.

>How do you categorize your races?
Mainly where they come from - whether from Faerie (like elves and maybe dwarfs), Delirie (like lizardmen, snake people, deep ones and other horrors) or are native to the world.

Humans managed to understand and control the immaterial spiritual energy that flows through the entire universe.
This discovery fixed the energy problem and brought prosperity to everyone.
They used this to build marvels, create new life forms and defeat aging.

But they were still humans and with this much power in their hands their pettiness led to wars and calamities that ravaged cities, destroyed most living creatures and quite literally cracked open the world.
Thousands of years after humans are starting to rise again, humble and afraid of the dangerous world their ancestors created but also curious and eager to explore it's ruins.

Whatever my players wanted.

Humans have the real world races, all mixed up because countries and geography got screwed up real bad, and there are some weirdo anime races aroud too.
At some point in the past people started to screw around with genetics for aesthetic reasons, weebs wanted their blue hair, and the bullshit carried over after the end.

Basicly, any race can exist and things that are associated with IRL races are irrelevant because of past genetic manipulation bullshit.
You want your Hugh Jackman looking dude to have purple hair. Sure.
You want your asian girl to be really tall. Totally normal.

I recently stumbled upon a simple but very rarely seen idea:

what if skin color and associated IRL cultures were not as associated in fantasy?
not!africans with ornate pagodas? not!asians in carved longhouses? not!arabs with feathers in their hair, body paint and inkan architecture? blonde not!vikings living in mosque-like palaces, with harems of veiled women?

Reposting from previous thread, because this might be useful for others too.

Remind me of some movies/games/whatever with a lot of different cultures, especially architecturally.
I'm making a collection of references to assign to cultures in my world, 'cos otherwise I can't connect with them.

Any cultural aspects are fine, but I'm mainly focused on architecture currently.

(I've already covered WoW, Disciples, HoMM, LotRO and Age of Empires)

Then why use that appearance? Why tie it to that culture unless you're just trying to be different?

If you say "human culture is like this but I want some diversity, so let's say black people live over here but their culture is still the same" that's one thing but saying "I want fake Japan but GET THIS- they're black!!" Is a bit weird

Tails:
>Help with balance
>Help with climbing
>Can use for underhanded tricks, like pulling a leg, throwing beer on their face
Of course, they get the special bonus suited for the tail. Scorpion tail must be venomous and must be useful for stinging. What they should be for is tricks. If it is a long, strong climbing tail, you should be able to reach higher places with it, and then with sufficient str, pull yourself up. Useful on forests and houses with horizontal support structures.

Wings: A choice must be made
>Arms are the wings, but they also work in a handy manner
>Wings are extra limbs
The latter would be magical, and I'd be sure to give 3 pairs if we go there. Normal flight and gliding, though, should be balanced. Extremely reduced weight and carry weight, and heavy penalties on distances. Hard limit to how much can be carried any distance.

>how would flight change a culture
Strong empires have always revolved around the quick flow of information and the ability to respond to situations. Spies, scouts, diplomats, mail would move quickly. Forget the pigeons! These beings would be sought after by others for these abilities, but they would also have an interest to keeping this ability to themselves. It is likely that they would move around a lot, and take marriages farther than usual, so the families would be smaller than the usual (extended).
>architecture
Why would you have doors on the bottom floor? Rather than having streets, they would have landing platforms or poles sticking out. Of course, rooftops would be easy landing targets, but with tall buildings this would be very frustrating, if it was the only way in. The ability to fly would allow them to burrow directly into dangerous locations, like cliffsides.
>life in general?
See more, think more. Especially when you find more limited beings. You'd grow arrogant easily.

>what would other races think about a race with tails and/or wings?
Primitives would see them as powerful and magical, possibly divine; as they see themselves inferior to nature. Ascending cultures would dislike tails as they see them as animalistic and inferior, but wings would be deemed superior and desirable. Decadent cultures would see merit in them as exotic, luxury and fetishes.
>what races have tails and/or wings in your world?
They are not quite the same, but my setting has Tieflings, half-dragons and Harpies. Harpies are the only ones with wings.

>your setting has races that have achieved interstellar travel, transcended into semi/demi/complete godhood, ascended to a higher plane of existance without any prementioned apotheosis, achieved immortality/longevity and created full-Matrix style virtual realities/dreamplanes
>What are the ramifications of this?

Most of those happenings created eventualities that led to the birth of the current races as we know them within said setting.

>everything East of the mountains should be a bone dry desert, especially around 30
absolutely not, rain shadows are not absolute determinants of desert. Ususaly they have to correlate with moisture and air current direction,
or are compounded with other geographical features. The Atacama and Tarim basin, two of the most noteworthy rain shadow deserts, are both on really high plateaus for example.

Don't feel like land "has" to be a desert because it is east of mountains, that's just silly and not realistic if that's what you're going for

Tell me about ogres in your setting.

I like this.

>>What is the greatest accomplishment of either a current of fallen civilization in you setting?
They figured out that they danced to the tune of the gods, proceeded to squander the play, made noise out of their music. Kept dancing, though.
>What are the ramifications of this?
Noise isn't that beautiful.

The vrath managed to circumvent the issue of traveling rapidly through other dimensions. The closest any other civilizations have come is making what amount to magic nukes.

>>What is the greatest accomplishment of either a current of fallen civilization in you setting?
>They figured out that they danced to the tune of the gods, proceeded to squander the play, made noise out of their music. Kept dancing, though.
>>What are the ramifications of this?
>Noise isn't that beautiful.

So basically Silmarillion?

Now that I think about it, yes. Though I did take more elements from Genesis- which obviously affected Tolkien as well.
I wanted to make sure that the theology and metaphysical narrative would be timeless, because of the setting spanning over two rises to the stars.

>I like this.

But why?

>date unknown

it says 1969 right there on the bottom left

Does anyone ever make settings that just like our Earth in our age but simply set on different planets?

Most fantasy is really just like our Earth in different ages but set on different planets.

>Most fantasy is really just like our Earth in different ages

Say this to a historian. I dare you.

>like our Earth
not
>exact expy of Earth at X time period

Is it too autistic of me if I want to detail a war that happened to the kingdom the PCs will exist in to the same detail as a historical narrative? I know it's unneccessary, but having some internal consistence like that can be nice, and it gives me a warm feeling in my tummy when I make reference to historical figures or events my players may not know.

As a historian, it most certainly is. It's difficult to create completely unique or new cultures without some sort of historic basis, and when one does try to create something from scratch, it often comes off as goofy. Obviously I raise an eyebrow when a culture is ripped straight into the world, without a thought how climate, topography, and history would have shaped it differently, but most fantasy societies are based on real socieities.

>just like
not
>kinda-sorta vaguely inspired by X time period

As another historian I could not disagree more. Most fantasy cultures are a crude bastardisation of their IRL counterpart(s). That aside, some sort of historic basis (accurate or not) is really not the same as being "just like our Earth". You can take inspiration from history, using the knowledge of how cultures functioned and evolved, and create something that does not resemble any particular historical group but is still plausible for it's environment. That's one of the most fun parts for me.

What does "just like our Earth" mean in this context?

Thought it was a picture of a brahmin for a moment.

Stress on the "really just" rather than the "just like".
The "just" is synonymous and could be replaced with any of the following: merely, simply, only, etc. The best thing to do would have been to omit the "just" entirely, I suppose. I'll be more careful with my grammer from now on, but this is a really autistic and pedantic thing to start an argument over, user.

It was meant to be a playful dig at the dubious historical accuracy of many fantasy settings, not a semantics argument. I don't think that's really autistic or pedantic but I agree we should let this one lie.

>should wings be functional?
If a race has wings they should be functional, I think. Decorative wings, or evolutionarily stunted wings could work, I suppose, but if a player sees a race with wings as an option, you're guaranteed that they'll expect them to work.

>should winged creatures fly with magic instead?
No, I don't think so.

>how would flight change a culture, architecture, life in general
Most obviously; stairs would be far less important.

>what would other races think about a race with tails and/or wings?
Tails I don't think would change much at all. If people are used to seeing tails it's probably no different from seeing a person of a different skin color in real life. Wings I could see having a larger impact simply because of how much they would impact how that culture functions compared to non-winged ones.

>what races have tails and/or wings in your world?
None at the moment. Granted, the setting I'm currently working on is still in a very conceptual stage. I have only set the general tone and started developing some conlangs (which is the first thing I create in all my world building projects).

>what is the greatest accomplishment of either a current or fallen civilisation in your setting?
One of the ancient orc chieftans managed to sell his soul to a deity to become a powerful warlock in order to unite the clans and fend off the Elven invaders from their homeland
>What are the ramifications of this?
The Elves came back after that chieftan died, and conquered. But the Chieftan's soul was still kept on this plane, as the deity had more use of him. A few hundred years later, the deity raised the four parts of the warlock in order to wreak havoc on the population

so, Warcraft, basically?
literally story of Gul'dan (replace elves with space goats)

I actually made a colour-coded chart!

If I had the ability to think ahead, I would've made the colours be like, how closely related they are? Like, Kobolds are more closely related to Lizardfolk than Yuan-ti, if ygm.
Not all of these are playable. I'd say up to Old World - Goliath would be playable, but if someone asked to play a Kobold, I'd fudge up some stats for them, sure.

Literally never read anything warcraft related.

It started off as me ripping off the Roman invasion of Celtic England, but then I saw a webcomic where there was a ghost and a skeleton that were both from the same dead guy, so I added that in as me BBEG

Why are tiefling not in with aasimar? If you're doing planetouched why separate them?

I had a bit of an insight about setting building in general I'd like to share, hopefully it's useful and isn't me remembering something from somewhere else and thinking it's my own idea.

To add a bit of depth to a world, start with one fact about the setting. An example made up as I went:
>Many plants in the jungles of this setting are carnivorous
Then you add an and.
>Many plants in the jungles of this setting are carnivorous AND they contain complex chemicals used in medical science
Then you add a because.
>Many plants in the jungles of this setting are carnivorous AND they contain complex chemicals used in medical science. BECAUSE these chemicals only exist in the plants, the people of the setting are very eco-concious.
Then you add a but.
>Many plants in the jungles of this setting are carnivorous AND they contain complex chemicals used in medical science. BECAUSE these chemicals only exist in the plants, the people of the setting are very eco-concious. BUT the carnivorous plants means that the fauna of this world has adapted to be very dangerous.

Then from there you can take one of the and, because, or buts make that the established fact that you then build more ABBs on to. You can also go back and add as many ABBs on to facts as you want.

I like this idea for creating race "trees".

Honestly, I'd made that "New world" side on its own long before the Old World came into play and didn't think to move them

thanks. I'd started reading Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari and loved the idea of a whole bunch of ancient humans all living together, so I thought about incorporating that into my setting.

It actually really helps with worldbuilding. I know that the "man" branch of the old world sentient races came about in the north of the continent, and the "beasts" branched off in the southern rainforests and mountains, so if you go north it's going to be a lot rarer to see an ogre or a goblin, but you're more likely to see a halfling or a dwarf. Rather than the typical D&D idea of "everyone is everywhere, do what you want".

>3 Human races (Mediterranean, Mongolian, and Central American based)
>Aeolans (see:, and
>Cannibal frogfolk (small, mean, great singers)
>Proteans (Oozefolk that developed from oozegolems)
>Elohim (sapient mana crystals hiding in a meat-body)
>Sharkmen (gypsies)

There are several lesser or unplayable races as well.
>Criders (giant spider/crab hybrids, psychic, ancient, good eating)
>Serpentfolk (sea-snake variety, fuckers)
>Ratfolk (small, cruel, stupid, pirates)
>Sky-Jellies (flying, invisible, carnivorous jellyfish)

What else could I add?

This sounds fun. Super weird

>Super weird
Deliberately so. Morrowind was a big influence, as was Darksun and Pirates of Dark Water.

I need some help.

I'm worldbuilding an ancient Mediterranean fantasy that resembles Europe, Africa, and the Middle East around 200 BC, but mirrored, so the ocean is to the east. The connected sea that divides the northern and southern continents is almost three times the size of the Mediterranean.

Now, I have nations and races based off the Roman Republic, Carthage, Scythians, Phoenicians, Celts and Gauls, etc. But I wanted to spice it up a bit since most of these look really familiar. There's a lot of volcanic activity around the southern continent and thus many volcanic islands, so I'm trying to build a confederation of island societies based off Polynesian culture, particularly the Tui'Tonga Empire, Maori, and the native Hawaiians.

However, even though the sea they're on is so much bigger than the Med and they're far away from most other nations, I'm having a hard time explaining how a prehistoric society could remain so culturally and ethnically distinct in a world dominated by Hellenistic nations in the early Iron Age / classical antiquity. There's some pretty dangerous sea life around them, but you would think at least one island would be trading with the rest of the world, allowing them to get superior weapons and slaughter their enemies.

Any ideas on how to balance this or should I just move them out of the sea and into a further, irrelevant area?

You could have it be that in the past there were two great civilizations, the Hellenes and the Polynesians. These don't have to be empires per se, but they need to be somewhat unified in that they hate the other group. Anyway some dispute breaks out, and the two factions go to war. I would do it on-and-off like how the hundred-years-war was, but the point is the Hellenes win and the Polynesians lose big. Some time later the Hellenes break up, but the vestiges of the Polynesians stay together. This explains why the Polynesians would still exist since 1. they're not going to assimilate to a culture that they both hate, and hates them and 2. the Polynesians are proven to be adept warriors, and even if they aren't spartans they're good enough to stop Polynesia from being fully conquered.

Would it ruin the vibes to have your Polynesians have access to iron-working? It does not have to be particularly advanced compared to Iberian or Celtic work of the period but would be logical unless there was something to completely bar contact. They would remain essentially Polynesian but charting what effects iron would have would also make them more distinct yet still familar compared to reality. Trade for advanced items such as maille they can't reliably produce themselves would be an interesting factor in politics and warfare of the region.

Keeping them culturally and ethnically distinct mostly means not having the islands incorporated into any empires, conquered by adventurers (who don't immediately assimilate) or having another culture set up colonies nearby for sustained contact and cultural blending.

There is also the issue that most classical ships had to hug the coast and beach often. Without ports or safe country along the way, a journey of that length becomes a lot harder and less likely to result in regular trade and contact. A long and treacherous coast inhabited by unfriendly people who be a real barrier to any Carthagian or Greek ships, as would putting the islands further off the coast with a long stretch of open water and unpredictable currents/weather. Not impossible, but unless there was a very lucrative reason it might only be undertaken by explorers and diplomats.

The Polynesians of course have ocean-worthy ships and navigation, but they might not share. Perhaps their catamarans pull into Carthagian ports every so often from beyond the edge of the known world with strange shells and trinkets they trade for good ironwork, glass and luxuries before disappearing off the map again.

The RL Polynesians covered the Pacific Ocean in their stone age. And the Maori successfully resisted the British Empire for a long time as well. I think if the sailors are good enough, and their warriors skilled enough, they can remain distinct from the others.

Hmm, I like both of these ideas. I'll probably have to do some moving around so that the islands are closer to the eastern ocean, which shouldn't be a problem. And if there's cultural conflict the descendants of the Hellenic civilization will be hesitant to explore dangerous waters with islands full of people who hate them.

As it stands, the two major seafaring nations are locked in a cold war, kinda mirroring the Punic Wars but with less outright conflict and more proxy wars, espionage, privateers, and jockeying for influence in buffer countries. Piracy is a big issue, so I wonder if any corsairs would flee to the islands to avoid capture after doing some hit-and-runs on merchant ships traveling along the safer northern coast. Maybe they are accepted by certain islands as outsiders, but attacked by others?

Thank you for the ideas.