As promised, here's a brief overview of the way my school system works. The magic system in my world is elemental (Earth, Air, Fire, Water), but mages (Wielders - working name) are more like Avatar benders than energy-wielding Aes Sedai. Magic ability is inborn: there are four "nodes" around the world that emanate energy, so the people who live near each node have the chance to be born with the ability to use the related elemental magic. There are several groups and organizations that teach Wielders; the largest and oldest is the Order, which has Academies near the four nodes. The Order got its start in the Creuzland Imperium; one of the early emperors was a Wielder who founded the first Academy. As time passed and the Empire expanded, the Order grew with it, visiting new lands and discovering all the types of magic. The Academies are open to all, except for criminals and people who are otherwise barred from entry for whatever reason. Tuition is free (see below for more on this). Students generally come to the schools when they're 12 years old, as that's about the time when the ability first manifests. They're taught the basics (reading, writing, math, Order history), along with the Imperial language (the lingua franca of the Order). They take placement tests to avoid retreading material they already know, and can also choose from electives. Classes run 4 days and 1 free day, x2 (10-day weeks). Terms run five months, with a one-month break at midsummer and midwinter, and students generally stay for a five-year course of study before they graduate (depending on their rank - see below); they can take graduate courses after achieving full Wielder status. Each Academy also has specific courses like meteorology, geology, and physics. Wielders are classed by rank, from 1-8, with the number of Wielders growing smaller the higher up you go. There are three types of Wielders: lesser (rank 1-3), full (4+), and martial (Wielders who learn weapons and martial arts to supplement their abilities; usually rank 1-3). Lesser Wielders never progress past the second year, and Rank 3s stop at the third year, unless they're martial Wielders. Lesser Wielders who complete their course of study are eligible to enroll at an Order-run academic school (these aren't free, but they pay reduced tuition). Anyone, no matter their rank, who completes their studies can formally join the Order. This brings various benefits, including the ability to take Order-sponsored jobs. The Order has enclaves in the capitals of most nations - they function much like embassies, but also serve as headquarters for Order personnel and guildhalls for Order members. Order-sponsored jobs are posted there, and members can take them, assuming they qualify. These jobs have better pay, but the Order takes 2% of the members' pay off the top - this goes to fund the Academies and enclaves.
I watch a lot of anime, and there's been a trend the last few years in shows/light novels/manga where the backstory is "some time in the past, something happened that granted humans the ability to use magic. Now there are schools to train mages." Aaaand... that's it, usually. Some have a little more, like "they fight off aliens/creatures from another dimension/etc.", but for the most part, there's very little world development beyond that, because almost all the action takes place at the school. Who cares about the world beyond, right? That's all well and good, but what role do they fulfill in the world? What do they do after they graduate? Do they just get a normal 9-to-5 job and forget about being the best mage/sword fighter/whatever at XYZ Academy? Do they go on to college and learn more powerful techniques and become professional mages (you know, like athletes play for sports teams), fighting in arenas around the world? Do they join the military/police force and fight crime? Do they become criminals themselves? Who knows? If your world has enough mages that they need a school to be taught/trained, then there should be a purpose for their existence. Awhile back, I talked about this in another post, so I'll skip that and get to the relevant bits: building and fleshing out your school(s). In the next post, I'll lay out some of the details of my schools as an example. * Is there more than one school? If so, where are they located? How do they interact - is it full cooperation, friendly rivalry like today's schools, competition, or all-out hostility? Note that this could apply to schools belonging to the same nation/organization as well as those that don't. * If there is more than one, do the schools differ in terms of prestige, curriculum, etc.? If they're run by the same organization, they're more likely to be similar. * When was it built, and by whom? Was it the brainchild of the ruler at the time, founded by an organization, or did it start from more humble origins, like a small group of independent mages teaching their apprentices? * Who runs the school? Is it private or state-sponsored? * How is the place funded? Does it charge tuition? If so, you probably don't need to know how much, but a general idea would be good (i.e., how affordable is it?). * Who can attend the school? I'm not talking about mages here - I mean nobles, commoners, and (if you have them) non-humans. Is the class divide large enough (or is the nobility powerful enough) that certain people are restricted from attending, or are forced to attend less prestigious (or less well-funded) schools? This will largely depend on your setting: if there are nobles and commoners (and if so, how do they interact), where the school(s) is/are, etc. Even if there are laws that require mages to receive at least basic training (and in a world where schools exist, you can bet at least one nation will have such a law), it doesn't necessarily mean that "all mages are created equal" - just look at the educational system today for a prime example. * Is there a minimum and/or maximum age for people who want to attend? * Do the students live on campus, like most colleges and universities, or are they allowed to commute from home? If the latter, you'll have to figure out how this affects the surrounding area. I grew up in a college town; there were lots of apartments and houses for rent, college students working part-time, and a noticeable decrease in people in the summer when classes were out. If the students live on campus, you'll have to add dorms or rooms (depending on how the school is laid out), a cafeteria/dining hall, and bathing/laundry facilities. * If the students live on campus, are they allowed off-campus? Is it free-pass, do they need special permission, or are they restricted except for holidays and weekends (see below)? Are outsiders allowed on campus? * Are there special facilities for teaching/training? This depends largely on the magic system, but any school worth the name will have a building or area set aside for experiments, training, or whatever. Many of these answers will be dependent on whether or not magic is learned (wizardry), or inborn (sorcery), or both. If people can be taught magic, it's a lot more likely that schools will be for-profit, run by private organizations or governments, and probably have restrictive entry requirements. If it's inborn, on the other hand, nations are more likely to have laws regarding training, schools will have lower (or no) tuition fees, and schools will be state-sponsored. That isn't to say that private schoools wouldn't exist in a world with inborn magic, or state-run schools for teaching magic - maybe some ruler long ago set forth a law stating that everyone could have equal opportunities to learn magic, or various organizations seek to woo sorcerers by offering better education than the baseline. Now that you've laid the foundations (pun intended), let's move on to the curriculum. * What is taught there? Obviously magic, but what about mundane subjects? A well-educated mage is worth a lot more than someone who can barely write her name, no matter how powerful she is. Perhaps the school requires a basic education beforehand, so they can focus solely on magic instruction. * Are there any required courses? Some magic types might lend themselves to certain courses of study, like the sciences, medicine, etc., in which case having more training might be helpful (or even necessary) in order to fully use that magic. * How long does the training last? Is it a set period, until students are trained to a satisfactory level (they pass a proficiency exam), or some other criteria? * What's a typical student's schedule? You needn't go into too much detail here, but it might help to know where your characters are supposed to be at any given time (or day). Do they get days off? What about holidays or vacations, like summer and winter break?
There have been several threads about magic and tech on this forum, so I thought I'd write a post about it. So you're writing a story, and it's either fantasy or urban fantasy, and magic and tech coexist. Great. The only problem is, you don't know how to make it work. Before I begin, I'll assume that you've got a fair idea how your magic system works. If you don't, you'd better sit down and do that before anything else, because you'll never get anywhere without it. Now then: * How long has mankind known about magic? In most fantasy worlds, magic has always existed (I don't recall any series where magic suddenly appeared, though I'm sure someone's done it); in urban fantasy, it leans more toward "hidden world" (magic and magical beings exist, but most people don't know about them) than "alternate history" (Anita Blake) or "open world" (technically The Hollows, though this is more "revealed world"). Again, I don't know of any urban fantasy series where magic suddenly appears/becomes available to a populace that didn't have it before (I think it would make for a fascinating series, but that's a topic for another thread). * When did people learn to harness it, and how advanced is their knowledge? Was it long ago, before major technological advancements were made, or was it more recently? Obviously, the presence of magic would change the course of history (see DJ Butler's Witchy Eye), but more importantly, it would change the course of technological innovation. Imagine what the Renaissance era would've been like if we'd had planes, or if the Mongols had had firearms, or if something similar to the atomic bomb had been developed during WWI. * How widespread is magic? Is it available only to those who can afford it, or is it common and cheap enough that everyone benefits from it? Remember: just because you have a magitech setting doesn't mean it has to be "magitech for all". Keeping it in the hands of the elite could make for an interesting setting, too - one where the rich flaunt their wealth and status by showing off how much magitech they have, or where the rich use their power to oppress the masses. * I would also ask how well your magic system lends itself to integration with technology, but if you're reading this post, you probably don't need to worry about that. Still, it might be a good thing to think about - are there limits to what magic can replicate or replace? More on this in a bit. ---- When I was researching magitech, I came across an interesting post. It's rather long, but the author summed it up pretty well: "So in a world without pre-existing technology, like one where magic is innate or common, the drive for progress would have to be fundamentally different to make any headway." Basically: if it's easier to do it with magic, there's little incentive to develop other methods. For example, if the people have access to instant communications through crystal balls or mirrors or whatnot, radios and telephones will probably not exist - at least, not the realms that have those magics (see above). Another way of stating this (I call it the Law of Innovation): People will use any system that works unless and until something better is developed, or they're forced to find an alternative. The better it works, the less incentive there is to improve upon it. No matter how well something works, there's usually someone who will try to improve upon it, but in general, innovations still fall under the Law of Diminishing Returns (the point at which the level of profits or benefits gained is less than the amount of money or energy invested). ---- Innovations are generally developed in this order, from most to least important: basic needs (food, clothing, shelter), labor-saving, transportation/shipping, communication, entertainment, quality of life (things that are not essential to survival, but make life better). Energy sources are also important, but a separate category. Basic needs goes without saying: if you don't have something to eat, a place to sleep, and some kind of protection from the elements, you're not going to live very long. Labor-saving devices run the gamut from the lowly plow to construction equipment. Can you use magic to move large, heavy objects, do fine manipulation, alter the structure of objects (refining ore, e.g.), manipulate matter and/or energy (earth-moving, water control, firefighting, electric power, etc.), teleport objects and/or people... the list goes on and on. Just think of your basic labor-saving device and then say "Can I do this better with magic?" Transportation/shipping go hand-in-hand. From the time we learned to tame animals and use them to haul goods, we've also used them for transportation. Wagons/carts, sleds, boats, trains, cars, planes - nearly any vehicle used to carry passengers can double as cargo transport. The question is, can you make it work better with magic? The Avatar universe is a great example of magic-assisted transportation - the Earth kingdom has Bender-power trolleys and a mail system; the Fire Kingdom uses steamships powered by Fire Benders, and the Water Kingdoms have Water-Benders moving their ships. Teleportation (via spell, gate, or portal) is a quick and efficient means of transport, though as I mentioned above, it might not be available to one and all. Communication is a big one. As the ability to communicate advanced, people could pass messages back and forth more quickly - news spread faster, rulers could govern their nations more effectively, and innovations and technology leapt forward as people could share their ideas and pool their knowledge more easily. Can magic send messages over long distances (either verbally, telepathically, or through, say, a spirit messenger)? If so, is there a limit to what can be sent (words, images, entire movies, etc.)? Entertainment goes along with communication, to some degree: radios and TV are a form of both communication and entertainment. Take things a step further, though: What if magic could replace CG/special effects? What about subliminal messages - is mind control a thing? Could it be used to summon creatures (for movies, TV shows, the circus, etc.)? The list here is nearly endless - anything you do for fun could be enhanced with or affected by magic. Sources of energy have a large impact on quality of life, as well as innovations and how we use them; magic can play a big part in what kind of energy is being used and how. Aside from the obvious elemental manipulation, can magic be used to draw forth, store, and/or transfer energy? For example, did someone invent a device that draws power from the Earth's magnetic field, taps into the heat in the Earth's mantle, uses solar power, or feeds off energy from another dimension entirely? Magic could also make things more energy-efficient (no matter what source they use), or able to use multiple sources of energy. And finally, we have quality of life. This ranges from the basic stuff like heat and AC for your living space to things classified as luxuries. Are these things more readily available through the use of magic? If alternate energy sources are more readily available, devices that use them would be too (and they would be cheaper). --- One final note: I want to include a "miscellaneous" category, for all the oddball stuff magic can do that people don't think about. I've been watching The Gifted, so I try to think about all the things mutants can do that would be helpful, rather than harmful. Telepaths, for instance, can do a lot - help people work through traumatic experiences, interrogate criminals, or communicate with those who can't speak. People with super-strength? No-brainer. Kinetics? Same as magic (see above). Portals, water-breathing, immunity to heat/cold/whatever.... The possibilities are endless - you just have to keep an open mind and take a minute to consider them. Ask yourself: "If I had this ability, what could (or would) I do with it?" Helpful Links * Lost Kingdom: A blog full of all kinds of fascinating stuff; each post "tackl[es] Magic (as well as issues like the existence of other races, gods which actually exist and interact with the world) as an overlay on top of historical data, which will format the final outcome of each subject." - a must-read for anyone using a high-magic setting.
I'm going to backtrack a bit here. Since I started off with fantasy, I didn't really see a need to worry about technology, so I skipped over that part. Some time after doing the basic world development, though, I asked myself that magical phrase "what if?". In this case, it was "what if the world had more advanced tech before the Sundering, akin to Final Fantasy?" (Refer to this post for more info about the history.) That got the gears turning. Since I'd already determined that the characters would be travelling a lot, having faster modes of transportation would make things a lot easier. Also, it's been 3000 years since the cataclysm, but records would've survived and people would (eventually) be able to adapt pre-Sundering tech (and really, I wanted to avoid medieval stasis). So, long story short, I ended up with magitech. The problem was, I had no idea how to do it, so I let it sit for awhile until I was struck by inspiration. Here's how it works: List several fields of technological innovation, and determine the most advanced innovation (item, process, whatever) in each field. I would stick to commonly available things, unless they have an impact on the story (that new weapon the neighboring kingdom is developing, for example). My list goes like this: Agriculture: Crop rotation, irrigation methods, pesticides, biotech; also which crops are cultivated where. Architecture: Buildings and materials - advances from the arch to the skyscraper, stone blocks to concrete and steel. How are buildings made? If magic exists, is it used to aid construction, or to fortify buildings? Is it slave labor, conscripts, or guild workers? Communication: Obviously, this covers everything from the telegraph to the telephone, but it also includes things like TV, computers, radio, etc. Education: Do schools exist, and if so, how advanced are they (primary/secondary/college)? Who can attend them? What subjects do they teach? Medicine: Procedures and treatments, knowledge in general, hospitals. How advanced is medicine in your world - do people still think sickness is due to an imbalance of the humors and leeches are a good treatment, or do they know more modern techniques? Science: I know, this is really too broad a category, but you really only need to figure out what's important to the story. This includes physics, chemisty, earth sciences (all the -ologies), metallurgy (especially important if you add new materials!), astronomy, etc. How do people see the world around them? Is science only studied by a few scholars, or is it taught in schools? Is science even a thing, or do people believe alchemy works (maybe it does!) and illness is caused by an imbalance of humors in the body? Where does the knowledge of various sciences lie, vis a vis Earth's timeline of discoveries and inventions? Transportation (land, air, sea, space): This is a big one. Has the populace advanced past using draft animals, and if so, what do they use to get around? Fun fact: In the Los Angeles valley in the early 1900s, there were plans to make an electric train system for mass transportation; car companies bought out the train companies and shut them down, which forced people to buy cars. Weaponry: Medieval, modern, futuristic. This will be informed by the type and level of magic - if it's easily incorporated/adapted into weaponry (or replaces it entirely), arms and armor could evolve entirely differently than in our world. Coupled with transportation, this could open a broad field of new innovations. Once you figure out the greatest advances in each field, decide who has them. If said innovations are possessed/controlled by a single entity or a limited group, figure out the hows and whys (how they got it, and why they're the only ones who have it). It'll usually be something basic like "it's a state secret (nukes)", but a more elaborate explanation ("it was deciphered from a series of carvings in a temple") might spark some ideas that help develop the world further or even kick-start a story. It takes a lot of effort to keep an innovation secret (see: nukes), and even more to suppress all knowledge entirely (there are almost always rumors, truthful or not). Ironically, the more advanced a culture becomes, the harder it is to hide things from the public due to the presence of mass media, instant communications, and improved methods of spying and bypassing security protocols. Keep in mind, too, that most innovations are spread through contact with other cultures (through trade, conquest, or espionage) - gunpowder, for example came to Europe from the Orient via the Silk Road. Helpful Links * The Diffusion of Innovations: "a theory that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread".
I read a lot, as any person interested in writing should. It's primarily fantasy/urban fantasy, but I read some fiction and sci-fi.; I also like to watch sci-fi TV shows and movies (I like Killjoys and Dark Matter). I've been reading Jean Johnson's Theirs Not to Reason Why series (good read, though the MC is a serious Mary Sue), and something about all the alien races made me think: if you wanted to do non-human races in fantasy, you would do worse than thinking of them of them as "aliens". I also started replaying the Mass Effect trilogy a few months back, and that made me think of something else: fantasy and sci-fi are simply two sides of the same coin. You probably just rolled your eyes and said "well duh" - it's pretty obvious when you think about it, right? Simply put, sci-fi is fantasy writ large. Observe: Setting: Fantasy generally takes place on a single world; rarely, it can cover a few different locations on different planes. Sci-fi takes place on anything from a single world to an entire galaxy, and sometimes even multiple galaxies. Instead of hopping on a ship and sailing across the sea to the next continent, you hop on a ship and fly to the next star system. Races: Both genres range from "humans are the lone race" to "the setting is home to several dozen races". As I mentioned earlier, if you want to make your fantasy races really unique, think of them as aliens. This is especially effective if they originate on a different plane or a continent/location that's never seen humans. Aliens don't think like humans - that's why they're aliens. They have a different set of morals, culture, standards of beauty and bravery and whatever. Sure, they can be like humans, but I think it's be better to start with something far away and adjust them to bring them closer to a human viewpoint, rather than vice versa - that way, you can retain a lot of the "alienness" that makes them unique, instead of making them seem like "humans with pointy ears" (or fur, or sharp teeth, or whatever). Magic: In fantasy, it's magic. In sci-fi, it's psionics. Either way, it's almost a given that you'll have one or the other. Magic is often genetic and sometimes taught at schools/academies, while psionics is also often genetic, but can also be granted through science (genetic alteration, advanced tech, or some powerful alien being/race) and can also be taught/developed. Magic can exist in a sci-fi setting, but that turns the genre more toward cyberpunk, steampunk, or magitech, which I'll discuss in another post. Religion/gods: As a rule, gods don't exist in sci-fi. You can, however, have god-like beings - creatures or races who are so far advanced that they're beyond the human ken (Clarke's Third Law takes effect here). Religion is pretty well a constant among all intelligent races, though: if you're self-aware, you tend to wonder where you came from, why you're here, and where you're going, and religion is a good way to explain that. Civilizations: In general terms, sci-fi and fantasy are nearly identical. A nation is still a nation, an empire is still an empire, you still have governmens and trade and laws and customs... but again, sci-fi does it on a grander scale. A nation in fantasy is equivalent to a planet or star system in sci-fi; an empire that spans a continent in fantasy could span an entire galaxy in sci-fi. Both genres feature lost civilizations, old races that turned to dust long before humans came on the scene, and ancient artifacts whose function and purpose have since been lost to the mists of time. Want to do something fun? Try converting your favorite sci-fi story to fantasy. Or vice versa. Take Star Wars, for example - it just begs to be made into a fantasy story. The Jedi are an order of martial artists who use ki power instead of the Force. They still fight with swords (which are not lightsabers), but these can vary depending on the user, or maybe Jedi can change the sword's form at will. Their role: let's say they're a group that transcends race and nation and works toward peace and harmony. The Sith, obviously, want to do Bad Stuff (tm) - destabilize governments, take over the world, crush the Jedi, etc. Droids could be replaced with clockwork constructs or just non-human races (depends on the tech level). The Death Star is still a massive engine of destruction, but its appearance and makeup could vary widely - anything from a monstrous sea-going ship to a massive land-bound vehicle to a mobile fortress carried on the backs of 10,000 undead slaves. Planets are turned into cities, the Empire becomes smaller (but no less of an Empire), and the Resistance remains as it is - a ragtag group of people fighting the Empire. Hell, file off the serial numbers, make a few alterations, and you've got a full series right there. On the flip side, you could take, say, Game of Thrones and make it into a space opera spanning worlds or even star systems. Most it's about war and politics - that stuff is universal. The White Walkers become an interstellar threat looming over all (see Jean Johnson's books). The Faceless Men? Easy - that's just advanced tech. The sorceress (her name escapes me now) would need a little tweaking, but she could be a psionic priestess. Since we're not going for an exact conversion, you can play around with it.
If you write fantasy, one of the things you'll hear (probably over and over) is "magic should have a cost" (or, often, must have a cost). I saw it many times when I was looking at magic systems for my story, and I've seen it plenty of times on this forum too. While I don't necessarily disagree with the sentiment (it makes for an interesting story), it's become something that people parrot without any real comprehension, like "show don't tell", or that whole thing about dialogue tags. (Hint: for the first, it's not that important; for the second, as long as they're used in moderation, it's fine.) What it all boils down to is "balance" - people think that magic is too powerful on its own, so they want to see a "cost" so that mages can't just up and take over the world, or deus-ex-machina their way out of everything. Of course, if your magic system is designed well enough and the story is written properly, this will never happen, but that's a topic for another post. What I want to discuss, here and now, is the concept of balance. Which means, basically, that magic should have limitations. Not necessarily a "cost": the word "cost" brings to mind something the caster has to offer or risk to use their magic: sacrifices (blood, flesh, lives), side effects (this one's popular - pain, physical disfigurement, mental issues/brain damage, illness, etc.), death (by various means), backlash (the Wiccan's threefold rule), and on and on. Limitations, however, are another form of "cost" that many people overlook. Time is a big one - if it takes ten minutes to cast a spell, that's a huge one - magic is severely limited in its use, if not its scope. Having to draw symbols and/or diagrams, chant words, use ingredients, make gestures or a series of movements (like a full-on dance); these are all limitations. Having items that are expended upon casting the spell (not necessarily ingredients, but actual sources of the power) is also a good one. The book Masks had an interesting concept: magic is a physical thing that bubbles up from underground like oil and can be mined or harvested; you have to have some to cast a spell, but once you do, it's gone (obviously, more power = more "magic" used up). If the caster has to make a pact with an otherworld being to gain power, that's a drawback (or a cost, either one) - only those powerful enough and/or crazy enough (depending on the being) will undergo the risk for the potential profit. Public perception (mages are shunned, reviled, or outright outlawed) is another, though I don't recommend using it on its own unless it's a central part of the story. Similarly, you could use "time to learn magic" - it could take decades to master anything beyond the most basic spells, so very few bother (again, not a great example, but I threw it in here anyway). A foil - some way that magic can be negated or otherwise circumvented - is also a limitation, though it's better used as a plot device. In the Wheel of Time, for example, Channelers could shield each other, cutting off your opponent from the source of their magic. There was also an herb called forkroot which, when ingested, prevented use of magic for a length of time. In the Avatar TV series, benders could be prevented from using their magic by surrounding them in elements besides their own - drop a firebender in an ice cave, suspend an earthbender in a wooden cage in the air, etc., and they're useless. Basically, what you're looking for is something that will make your story interesting. Look at your world and your magic system - what makes sense as a limitation, given the world's history and the way magic works? What would make for a good plot and situations where your hero - assuming (s)he's a mage - will have to struggle to proceed, or may even fail outright? Answer those questions, and you're on your way to making a unique magic system.
Since my characters are going to be travelling to various nations, I did some research on coins and currency. Coinage is one of those things that seems really minor, but it's the minor details that more verisimilitude. There's an amazing variance in the kinds of coinage used throughout history. The first coins were created in the 7th and 6th centuries BCE in Greece, India, and China (aka, the earliest civilizations). China even had paper money about a thousand years ago. Coins can take a surprising number of forms. The most ubiquitous is, of course, the round coin, but we also have square (in modern times, they have rounded edges for vending machines), 8/10/12-sided, and oval (common in the Orient). The edges can be milled, scalloped, or notched, to prevent clipping. Oriental coins often have holes or squares punched out of the middle to permit them to be strung on a lanyard. Coins are always stamped with some sort of design - often it's the likeness of the ruler who commissioned them, or a god/goddess; other common themes are animals, landmarks, or simple designs, often with a legend (writing, often a phrase of some sort). 90% of coins you seen in fantasy novels are copper, silver, gold, and (rarely) platinum. While these were in use in the real world, there were also a variety of other metals used: electrum (a naturally-occurring silver/gold alloy; rare), cupronickel (a copper/nickel alloy, sometimes used to debase silver coins), iron, lead, nickel (used since ancient times), brass (the Romans), and bronze (not that common, surprisingly). Your world could have other materials that are more or less common or valuable. Just keep in mind that we used softer metals for a reason - they're easier to stamp. It just so happens that many of them were also precious metals. Cultures don't always rely on coinage as currency; many use livestock (chickens, goats, horses, cows), random silver items, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacksilver, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knife_money knives (ancient China), food (salt, cocoa beans, or cheese), or other odd items. Cultures for whom metallurgy is impractical or impossible (undersea races, or those who live in a metal-poor world like Dark Sun) could use tokens of ceramic or bone, or beads of precious/semi-precious gemstones (agate, garnet, jade, pearls, coral, etc.), which could be pierced so as to be strung on a line. And finally... denominations. Most nations have a base amount (like the Dollar or Euro), which they can then subdivide into smaller units (as coinage) and multiply into larger units (as larger bills or, rarely, also coinage). Coinage typically appears as one or more of the following: 1/100, 1/20, 1/10, 1/5, 1/4, 1/2. So, for example, you could have the gold Mark as the base currency, then copper (at 1/100 mark), bronze (1/10), silver (1/2), etc. Or you could switch it up and have 20 coppers to the bronze, 15 bronze to the silver, and 3 silver to the gold. It's all up to you. * Wikipedia entry on coins: A central page where you can check out all the currencies of the world. * 10 Strange Forms of Ancient Currency: Not all currency was coinage, or even money.
Everyone loves a good mystery. I'm not talking about the classic whodunnit, but the less common mysteries you find in fantasy worlds - the abandoned city, the ancient statues, the strange carvings lining the face of a cliff in the middle of nowhere. Who made them, when, and why? This is something that's often overlooked in fantasy stories. Take our world, for example. Angkor Wat, the Nazca Lines, Macchu Picchu, the Cahokia Mounds, the Easter Island moai, Stonehenge... all of these are remnants of previous cultures and civilizations that left their mark. In some cases, we don't know who made them, how, or why, but they continue to excite our imagination. On the less tangible side, you have the myths and legends. Did you know that almost every culture on Earth has some variation of the Flood myth? Sadly, many fantasy worlds are lacking in this respect. Sure, they might have long, detailed timelines with thousands of years of history, but they lack the evidence of all that history. Low fantasy is rife with them: Robert E. Howard's Conan series is a great example of ancient cultures - you can't walk ten miles without tripping over an abandoned ruin, old statue, or a tomb. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire also features lots of things that will never apepar in the books, or be explained - there's an entire continent (Sothoros) that is largely unexplored and has abandoned cities, old ruins, and strange creatures. Another way to go is Jordan's Wheel of Time series: back in the Age of Legends, people had much more advanced technology, the knowledge of which was lost during the war; now all that exist are scattered examples like the Tower of Genji, the Choedan Kal, and mentions of ancient wonders. Of course, doing this is something like walking a tightrope. Look at the TV show Lost: it's rather infamous for tossing all kinds of random phenomena into the show, but in the end most of it was either poorly justified, or not explained at all. (FYI: "Magic!" is not an adequate explanation.) On the other hand, a good magician never reveals all his secrets: keep a few things hidden behind the curtain, and leave the readers always wanting more.
So you've created a world and populated it with various cultures. You've probably already decided long before now whether or not to add non-human races, and which ones they'll be, so let's take a moment to think this over. In the 80s and 90s, it seemed like elves, dwarves, orcs and such were pretty much required to appear in any fantasy world, thanks to the influences of D&D and similar RPGs. In the last 10 years or so, though, fantasy is becoming more human-centric, with the other races appearing less and less frequently. This can be a good thing - in the sea of human-centric worlds, one with multiple races will stand out. It's just a matter of whether or not readers will show interest in it. Does the world really need non-humans? I.e., are you including them just because you think they're necessary, or do they serve a purpose? I'm not talking a purpose like allegory or metaphor, although those are fine. What I mean is, do they fill a niche? Nearly every creature on Earth today is here because it fulfills a role - from the smallest bacterium to the largest whale, they've evolved over millions of years to be where they are, and those whose roles are no longer important or who can't adapt go extinct. Where did they come from? This is a huge question, and one that is often ignored. Granted, it doesn't usually have a bearing on the story, but it can shape a race's history - how it interacts with other races, its myths and culture, and even how members view themselves. Did they evolve from some lower life form, like humans did from the apes? If not, you should know how and why they came about. Did the gods put them down on the earth, fully-formed? Did they come through a portal to this world from another? Were they created by another race, or a single being? How do they interact with other races? Are they open and welcoming, interbreeding with others (more on this later), or closed and xenophobic, attacking outsiders? Are they territorial, nomadic, content to settle in other races' lands, or something else entirely? There are a lot more, like actual biology, but let's stick with this for now. In Earth's prehistory, there were dozens of different species of humans, most of which interacted with each other in some form - some were wiped out by competing races (either deliberately or through communicable diseases), and others died out because they were less adaptable, or because of environmental factors (climate change). And yes, there is evidence that our ancestors interbred - I'm sure you've heard that most non-African humans carry 1-4% Neanderthal DNA; scholars also agree that we interbred with the Denisovans, a group that lived in what is now middle Asia (Pakistan, up into Siberia), and another, as-yet-unknown group. So: Any time two races or cultures come into contact, they'll interact; if their biology is compatible, they'll mate, and if the genetics are close enough, they'll produce offspring. Which, of course, begs the question: Are humans and these races in your world genetically compatible? If so, what do their offspring look like, what abilities (if any) do they have, are they sterile, and how do their parent races view them? How common are they, and where do they live (this leads back to how they're viewed/treated by their parent races)? Aside from RPG worlds, half-breeds, crossbreeds, and hybrids are seldom mentioned or dealt with. Sure, you could just say "they're all incompatible"; that's great, as long as you know *why*. For the love of all that's holy, if you're going to add new races, please don't use the same tired old tropes. Elves, dwarves, orcs, gnomes... boooring. Give us something new - a race of lizard-like beings that live in the swamps; sentient spiders that inhabit the deep forest reaches; aquatic fish-men or cetaceans living in the oceans. Don't limit yourself to humanoids: dolphins and whales are generally accepted to be nearly as smart as humans (if not more so), and you're creating a fantasy world - the sky's the limit. If you really must use one of the tropes, give it a new spin - cannibal elves, desert dwarves, swamp orcs... or combine attributes of two or more races into something new. Be original. Have fun with it, as long as it all makes sense in the end.
What's in a name? Quite a lot, actually. You probably know the saying "the clothing makes the man"... well, it's the same with names. Unlike real people, characters can get any name you wish to give them, so you should make the effort to give them something that fits - both the person and the story. You don't want to call your fantasy knight Joebob Bumblethorpe III, unless you're writing a parody, in which case it's perfect. As I mentioned before, I write fantasy, and it's tough for me to come up with names. I kept a list of them, back when I wrote stories in my first world - people, towns, inns, etc. - for when I needed them. They were all right, but they lacked character. If you want to evince a certain culture, a time, a feel for your story, your names need character. Even if you think it doesn't matter, it does. Every world, every city, every setting, no matter where it is, is unique and should have its own names. For people like me, random name generators are a godsend. YMMV, of course; some people prefer to do their own heavy lifting, and that's great - I tip my hat to you, who are creative enough to do that. My absolute favorite is fantasynamegenerators.com. Over 900 gens, everything from real-world names to fantasy and sci-fi; people, places, things, groups, and even some description generators - you name it, it's either there or in the queue to be made. It takes a huge load off to be able to flip through a few pages of names and pick something you like (and possibly modifying it), rather than have to take the time to think up something yourself. (As a side note, Emily, the site owner, is a really nice lady - if you go over there, drop her a line and say hi - she loves to hear from the people who use her site.) The great thing about such a huge variety (besides the huge variety, of course) is that you can mix and match names and cultures and races with a lot less effort. Let's take my world, for instance: one of my races, the Vargrim, use dwarven names for their cities, but I use Mongolian names for their people - as it turns out, Mongolian and FNG's dwarven have a lot in common, as far as construction. Both languages work really well because the Vargrim are sonorous - they have large chests, deep voices, and are excellent singers, so their language is rich with deep sounds, long vowels, and rolling consonants. Likewise, the Ma'jaat, another race, are largely based on Arabic culture. For them, I went with Elder Scrolls Khajiit - their language has Persian and Hindi influences. It evokes the Middle Eastern feel without actually being (overtly) Middle Eastern. Of course, I couldn't use Khajiit names for the cities and nations, so I had to go with Middle Eastern names there, but again - I can pick and choose names that fit the overall theme I've created. This leads into my final point: If you want to use something that's "close but not quite", there are dozens of pop culture generators that are based on real-world cultures - French, Spanish, Middle Eastern, Oriental, Russian, English, and about a dozen each of elves and dwarves. Go dig through them, and you can find all kinds of cool stuff. Edit: I forgot something: naming conventions. 99% of the names you see in fantasy are either (first name last name) or (single name), because that's what you see in western culture. The real world isn't like that, though, and neither should fantasy worlds. Besides the "normal" names, you have: * Surname-given name (common in Oriental cultures). * Given Name-clan name * Given Name-son/daughter of-(last name) - Scandinavian and Scots-Irish (-son/dottir, O', Mc, Mac, and nic') * Given Name-surname-patronymic (Russian) And of course, you can make all kinds of variations thereof. The Ma'jaat, for example, use <given name> <son/daughter of> <clan name>. Honorifics (polite forms of address) are also something that can add color to a culture. Eastern cultures are big on honorifics - Japan has a ton of them - but they appear in almost every culture - Mr., Ms., and Mrs., Dr., Esquire... those are all honorifics. Instead of going with the same tired old "master" and "mistress", toss out a <last name>-sen or eare-<last name> (that's "honored" in Frisian, a term that could be used for someone of great age or learning, or simply respect. Google Translate is a great resource.) Handy Links: * Fantasy Name Generators: 900 generators and counting (despite the title, it covers real-world and sci-fi names too).
I couldn't think of any clever titles this time. These two kind of go hand-in-hand, so I thought I'd deal with them in one post. I've been working on cultures and nations for awhile now, and it's been coming along, slowly. One thing that helped me was to come up with a "continental archetype" - that is, what type of culture is predominant over a given continent. For example: Ivros, the continent housing the Creuzland Imperium, is largely European - Creuzland is Germanic; it rose to power a few centuries after the cataclysm, when most other parts of the world were still getting their act together. After its collapse, the nations that formed from the ruins would be semi-related - the UK, Denmark, Austria (English, Scots-Irish, Dutch, and German). Down south, where the Vargrim set up shop, their culture most resembles Japan's - a strict caste-based society where men stand above the women; they're very ritualistic and worship their ancestors. Nearby nations are also Oriental - Chinese, Mongolian, etc. The upper rim of the central continent is Mediterranean - French, Spanish, Italian, Greek, and Turkish. And so on. Something I learned from Michael Stackpole's books - don't be afraid to mix and match cultural elements. In one of his novels, he had a nation whose people had French names, but the culture was Japanese. Creuzland, for example, uses Russian architecture (it just fit them somehow) and culture. Everyculture.com (link below) is a great resource for mixing and matching. I didn't really feel like fleshing out every single culture if I didn't need to (I follow the maxim of "don't do more work than you have to"), so I came with the idea of primary, secondary, and tertiary cultures. Primary cultures are those where most, if not all, of the action takes place, or the nation/culture is important to the story. These are the most developed. Secondary cultures, obviously, are not as important - only some of the action (maybe a chapter or two) takes place there, or a supporting character is from this nation, so you'll need to know some minor details beyond the basics. Tertiary cultures are basically just window-dressing. They don't appear at all, or very briefly - someone's passing through, they're mentioned in a book or conversation, or a minor character is from there. These can also be lost or ancient cultures. They don't need more than the basic writeup - a name, location, language, and maybe a few cities. Here's what I came up with for "cultures in a nutshell" (which can also be applied to races/nations): * Description: A brief overview of the race/culture/nation - where/how they live, and other information of note that doesn't fall into the other categories. * Appearance/dress - pretty self-explanatory. * Names/address - Naming conventions (given name-surname, or vice-versa; given name only; given name + clan/family/city/ship name; given name + "son/daughter of xx"). * Language - name of the language(s) spoken there. * Customs - births, deaths, special ceremonies (coming of age), how do they treat guests, holidays/observances * Relations - How they get along with their neighbors/other races. * Religion/beliefs - gods/no gods/something else entirely, maybe creation myths, if they're applicable * History - any special events This covers 90% of what you need for any culture. ---- Nations When I'm working on this, sometimes I have an idea for a culture in a certain part of the world and come with the nation later, and sometimes it's the other way around. When I was reading through AllCultures, I noticed something - the less advanced a culture is, the less likely it is to identify itself as a "nation". This is not to say that they won't have some form of governance, or a territory with marked borders; it's just that they don't think "We belong to the nation of Ibristia." They'll identify with family or clan first, culture second (as in, they acknowledge that their family/clan belongs to a larger group of people of the same race/cultural inclination). A good example of this would be the Native Americans - all the tribes had names for themselves, they had leaders and rules and territories, but they didn't consider themselves to be sovereign nations, because what did it matter? Even today, you find clan cultures in Africa, Asia, and the Americas, so don't be afraid to just have a territory marked as "clan lands for xxx", draw some rough borders, and leave it at that. Nomadic and farming cultures are generally going to far outweigh the more advanced cultures in any given fantasy world. Leading off the above (and something I constantly have to remind myself): Not every square inch of the map has to belong to someone. In fact, it shouldn't. Any race will settle in places most conducive to its survival, leaving the more hostile ones for later, when there's not much else left. This means mountains, deserts, swamps, or even areas with little to no perceived value (plains and grasslands far from rivers or the sea, e.g.) will most likely not be heavily occupied, if at all (it's not to say that you can't have the odd culture somewhere, like the Incas or Sherpas, but it should be the exception, not the rule). Likewise, civilizations rise and fall - the empire that once covered ten thousand square miles once contained a large plain; no one else has the strength to claim and hold it, so it remains populated only by bands of nomads or the odd farming settlement. Nations tend not to be too large, unless the people of your world have an easy way to communicate/travel over large distances (via magic, magical creatures, etc.). AS evidenced by our own history, however, empires can cover tens or even hundreds of thousands of square miles. Handy Links: * World Culture Encyclopedia: A list of just about every modern culture on Earth. It's a bit outdated, but a fantastic resource if you just want to browse around for ideas.
Yes, it's another magic entry. Last time I just blathered on about my magic system; this time I want to talk about magic in general. For the purposes of this entry, those who use magic will be referred to as mages, the use of magic is casting, and the end effect is a spell. Magic Types There are dozens upon dozens of different types of magic. In her guide Magical World Building, Stephanie Cottrell Bryant describes four basic types: Sorcery: Also called wizardry, this is the classical magic - chant a spell, draw upon some energy, and get the desired effect. Divine: This is similar to sorcery, but the source of the caster's power comes from a greater being - divine, demonic, or something else. Psychic: Psychic powers like telepathy and clairvoyance are generally not considered magical abilities, but there are some series that use mental powers that could be considered magic - Robin Hobb's Wit and Skill are good examples. The power is manifested straight from the user's mind and generally has a limited range of use. Items: Magic can only be used through the use of specific items. R.A. Salvatore's Demon Wars Saga is a good example of this; casters harness the energy inherent in gemstones to achieve the desired effect. One book I read called Masks (E.C. Blake) had magic as a physical liquid; the only way mages could use magic was if they had some of it at hand, and it would be used up when the spell was cast. I've read a couple sources where magic was too unstable to use effectively without a refining focus (wand, staff, etc.) - and, of course, there are the ones like Harry Potter where you actually need a wand to cast magic. How common are mages? Is it like Avatar, where every third person is a Bender, or more like Conan, where magic is extremely rare? Is magic inherent, inborn, or learned? By that, I mean: Is it endemic to one or more races? There should be a reason why those races are inherently magical. Are some people born with the ability? If so, who, and how? Is it only passed down through bloodlines, is it random, or is there some other criteria entirely? Can anyone learn to use it? This is often the case with wizardry - in Patrick Rothfuss' Name of the Wind series, for example, people can be trained to learn the Names of things in order to control them or use their power. Is your world high- or low-magic (or somewhere in between)? Avatar is a great example of a high-magic world - people have incorporated Bending into their everyday lives like we did with technology, using it to make things easier. Keep in mind two things, though: 1) The tech level for such worlds is likely to be higher than normal, as people will have invented things to take advantage of magic (it really depends on the type of magic here, but basically anything that makes work easier - everything from horseless carriages to communication devices to weapons. 2) Subsequent to the above: Many inventions that we take for granted might not exist, as they could be replicated by magic. I.e., why use planes when you can fly? How does everyone view magic? For starters, I'll to link to a blog post I found. I'll just add my own thoughts: People's views of magic will be colored by how magic has been used in the past. Let's hie back Avatar yet again: Benders are common, but people view them differently depending on where they are (talking about Aang's version here): the Fire Nation was a bunch of power-hungry dicks, so people naturally feared them. Contrarily, Earth and Water Benders were well-liked and respected in their countries because they served the people. In WoT, the Aes Sedai are not nearly as common, and they tend to hide their capabilities from the masses (not to mention they act high and mighty to boot), so the common folk hate and fear them. Humans tend to fear that which they don't understand. This is why, in low-magic worlds where mages are rare, someone walking down the street with a glowing ball floating over his head would draw all kinds of attention - and not just the "Ooh look, pretty!" variety. However, as Atsiko (yes, he's a guy) mentioned in his post, if mages in a low-magic world were open and helpful with their magic, people would better understand and come to appreciate them; likewise, if the mages in a high-magic world used their power to oppress the masses, use their powers for their own good, or simply avoided contact with the normals, people would still view magic and mages with distrust and/or fear. It's all in how you set things up. And finally... Magical items. Do they exist? If so, How are they made (and how easily)? Can any old mage go down to the corner store, buy the components, and enchant a light wand to sell at the market, or are they incredibly rare because the formulae have been lost for centuries (cliche)? Can they only be created by greater beings (read: gods and demons)? How common are they? Obviously, items that are easier to make are more likely to be more common, but that doesn't mean they have to be. How powerful are they? Magic items can range from minor potions and glowstones to continent-levelling artifacts. Who can use them? Are they restricted to those with magical ability, can anyone use them, or are they a mix of the two? Handy Links: * Atsiko's blog on magic: Some interesting stuff here.
(I was going to hold this one until later, but I kind of need to explain it first, so that things that come later make more sense.) Ever since I read Robert Jordan's The Eye of the World in high school, I've been fascinated by elemental magic. I played D&D for a long time and also designed new material, and I came up with lots of spells and classes and such that used elemental magic of one kind or another, usually focused around a single element. The initial version of the magic system was rather vague: there were four elements (Air, Earth, Fire, Water), and mages were employed to head off natural disasters or something by manipulating the actual element itself, not energy like WoT. The power for magic was drawn through ley lines (another theme that I thought was cool at the time; they were popular in fantasy, but the Rifts RPG also used the same concept). I did know that, a long time in the past, someone had "broken" magic, separating it into its component parts - i.e., mages used to be able to use all four elements, but now they can only access one. Rarely, someone is born who can use more than one element (originally, it was up to four, but I reduced it to two). I tinkered with it over the years, adding and changing things as I came up with new ideas. The ley lines thing went first. I was inspired by the second Avatar series to add eight new elements (Storm, Ice, Blood, Wood, Metal, Shadow, Lightning, and Light), which meshed with the "broken magic" concept and helped it to make more sense, and also added a lot more story options. Magic is genetic - either you're born with the ability, or you aren't. There are outside factors that can affect this - proximity to an elemental node, your bloodline (more Wielder ancestors means a greater chance), and your race (non-humans manifest about three times as often as Humans) - but anyone, regardless of race, can be born with the Talent. It ends up being about 5% of Humans and 15% of the other races (I figure there are 250 million people on Olland- you do the math). ---- A little history, because this is kind of the central precept of the world: A few thousand years ago, magic was one source - any mage (called Wielders) could use any element (to a greater or lesser degree; all but a rare few were strong in only one or two elements), and could even combine their effects - holding a sand in the air and heating it with Fire to turn it into glass, for example. Academies were established where Wielders could learn to use and control their ability, but the schools were largely autonomous - each nation had its own, and there was no governing body, so they each had their own standards, curriculum, etc., and each was loyal to its parent nation (and that nation's allies). One year, a war broke out between two nations. It dragged on for years, pulling more participants into it - those allied to the nations, and some who sought to seize an opportunity to grab power or territory. Eventually most of the world was engulfed in the conflict. Sometime during the war, someone perfected the process to create mindless, soulless constructs called "dragons" (which varied in appearance depending on the creator, but were basically classical dragons) - basically, a mass of elemental matter bound into a form of the creator's choosing. Dragons could only be created via a ritual and controlled by a powerful Wielder, who was linked to it. Even though the knowledge was initially limited to the Academy that first created them, it soon got out through various means, and other Wielders made their own, which resulted in even more destruction. One major downside to using a construct (and something no one knew, at first) was that if a Wielder was killed while controlling one, his or her consciousness would inhabit the soulless construct, creating a new, sentient, and effectively immortal being. Some of them, upon discovering their fate, went insane; others revelled in the destruction they could cause in their new form, and still others simply vanished. Not long after this came to light, the Academies put a ban on the creation of constructs by tacit consent (though this didn't stop unaffiliated individuals from creating their own). Naturally, this didn't stop the Infused already wreaking havoc. A group of Wielders who opposed the war came up with a new plan - if they took magic away from the people, maybe it would halt the conflict and/or destroy the dragons (since they were sustained by magic). They gathered to perform a ritual during a lunar eclipse to temporarily bind magic, so that they could force everyone to take a step back and possibly negotiate a peace. The ritual was underway when a group of Infused attacked, disrupting it. The spell went awry and, instead of being bound, magic was shattered into its component elements. The resulting backlash caused catastrophic natural disasters - tidal waves, massive storms, volcanic eruptions. The land heaved, the skies fell, and the seas boiled. This cataclysm, which lasted nearly a month, later became known as the Shattering. When it was all over, most of the world had been reshaped, and nearly 70% of the population was dead. The remaining Infused vanished during the chaos and were soon forgotten. The elements manifested as "nodes" of invisible energy; they appeared at the site of the ritual and slowly travelled across Olland, wreaking more havoc as they went, until they settled into places that best suited them. This took another decade, during which magic was highly unstable and everyone learned to mistrust or even fear it for its unpredictable (and often dangerous) effects. Eventually things settled down, magic became stable, and the "lesser elements" began to manifest. To make matters worse, strange beings were born to families lived near the nodes - children who had been altered by magic into new forms. These gave rise to new races - Avarii, Ma'jaat, Khmuss, and Valdameri - which could interbreed with Humans, but not each other. The next few centuries later became known as the Dark Ages - a time when nations and civilizations were trying to establish themselves, the new races appeared, and Humans came to terms with the fact that they weren't the only race on Olland any more. Records of this time are few and scattered, and no one's exactly sure how long they lasted (estimates range from 3-500 years). The commonly agreed end of the Dark Ages is the rise of the Creuzland Imperium. Creuzland conquered most of the land on one of the northern continents and created a new empire. The emperors were largely decent rulers, and the people under their rule flourished, which enabled civilization as a whole to recover more quickly. Fifty years later, Emperor Ranulfus, a Lightning Wielder, sponsored the first Academy in the Imperial capital of Vilsstadt. With magic and the Academies now legitimized, other nations starting establishing new Academies. It wasn't until a century or so after that the current Headmaster of the Vilsstadt Academy came up with the idea to establish the Order - an organization independent of all nations that would oversee all the Academies and magic in general, and would not take part in any nation's politics or conflicts (more on this later).
World-building, for me, is hard. I know some people can spend all their time doing nothing BUT world-building and coming up with millennia of history and entire books of lore, but I just can't seem to do that - all those little details escape me. Even if you're only doing a small portion of one, you have to include geography, climate, economics, and sociology (basically: where is the place located, what kind of weather does it have, what kind of coinage and industry does it have, what kind of people live there, their culture(s), and their relations with/to each other). If you want to get more in-depth (or have multiple races), you'll probably also need to delve into theology, biology, botany, linguistics, and politics. If you want to do a whole world, you have all of the above, plus possibly astronomy, geology, and a few other sciences I'm sure I'm forgetting. And that's just dealing with the realistic stuff - if you throw things like magic or fantasy races into the mix, that's another can of worms entirely. Sure, you can skimp on a few of those - the flora/fauna probably won't differ much from Earth's, it'll have one moon, and who cares about the other planets? - but if you want to make a living breathing world, you still have to pay attention to where the story takes place, and what kind of tech level said location has. This means research. Lots and lots of research. What kinds of metals would a fantasy culture reasonably be able to smelt? What kinds of flora would you find in a given climate/altitude? What would be the effect of multiple moons on an Earth-sized planet? Want to include technological advances like the printing press, clocks, gunpowder, or telescopes? Might be a good idea to find out when they were invented on Earth, so you'll have some clue about the level of tech at the time (i.e., would it be possible in your world?). ---- (At this point, you're probably thinking: If it's that hard, why the hell would you want to create an entire world, as opposed to a few nations or a continent or two? That's a very good question. See, the plot I'd come up with required the characters to travel all over the world trying to recover a bunch of magical artifacts before the bad guys can use them to perform a magical ritual that would cause a world-wide cataclysm. I've often wondered if I'm biting off more than I can chew, but the more I work on this world and the plot, the more things start to fit together, and the more confident I feel about the whole thing.) ---- So, as far as my world went, I wanted to make it near Earth-sized, for the sake of convenience. As I noted before, I'm not very good with drawing my own maps. I found this site when I started looking for random world generators. It's mainly geared toward RPGs, but it has all kinds of neat stuff that writers can use too: a calendar (accounts for up to 13 moons, plus adjustable weeks/months), several "random xxx" gens, a demographics calculator (if you're feeling lazy, or it doesn't really matter), and more. Anyway, the world gen has a hex map option, which is what I chose - the characters in my first story would be travelling a lot, and I wanted to be able to measure how far they were going. Also, since I couldn't get exactly the world I wanted the first time out, I had to sort through dozens of worlds, picking out landmasses that looked good and pasting them into a separate file - hexes made it a lot easier to align everything properly. After a bit of work, this is what I ended up with (note: I did this in MS Paint, since I don't have Photoshop; I was also very inexeperienced with Paint, so I learned a lot of things along the way. More on this later). I was so stoked to have an actual, honest-to-god map that I immediately made smaller images of the continents so I could have separate maps on which to write stuff, then took it down to my local print shop and had them print it all out, because I didn't have a printer (It wasn't that bad: around 6 USD for three 11x17 inch (A3) maps and three 8.5x11 (A4) maps). That map is around 4400 miles (7100 km) high by 10,200 miles (16,415 km) wide. So I was all excited, took my stuff home, and started scribbling on it - doing borders, cities, and such. It was about that time that I discovered Paint will let you add text to an image. Mind, blown. I'd thought MS Paint was pretty primitive and wouldn't allow me to do something so high-speed as that. It actually allows for a wide range of stuff - you can add shapes, obviously; text (in all kinds of fonts, sizes, and formats), and you can even invert/flip part of the image (don't like how that land mass looks? Flip it around!). If you don't use a hex map like I did, you can even resize your landmass(es). It wasn't until after I'd gotten all the nations placed that I started to wonder about little things like climate - for that, I needed latitude lines so I could figure out where everything lay. This site helped me to figure out how far apart the latitudes lay - it also helped me to realize that my "world" was far, far too small - what I'd thought was 90% the size of Earth was actually about 30% (the Earth is roughly 25,000 miles/40,000 km in circumference). Oopsie. I mean, sure, it could've worked if only wanted to use PART of the world, but I had to use ALL of it (for reasons I will explain in a later post). So, it was back to the old drawing board. My map was limited in size because I didn't know that you could increases the size of the drawing space in Paint (also, the continents were really too small - the easternnmost one, for example, is the size of Tajikistan). Once I figured that out, I was able to make it exact size I needed. Another dozen or so iterations through the map generator, and I'd come up with a bunch of new (larger) continents, and I eventually ended up with this. (Side note: While using a random map generator is really handy, you have to pay attention to the landmasses - the program will sometimes duplicate certain landforms. I found a pair of continents (large islands the size of Greenland, really) separated by a strait and thought "Cool! I wanna use this!" so I dropped it into my map - one island on either end (they're separated by the meridian line). Two weeks later, I was looking at the map while working on some other things and realized that they were mirror images of each other. *sigh* On the bright side, I found a new continent that actually fit better.) Edit: You might have noticed my map is rectangular. Planets are (semi-)spherical - when maps of the Earth are laid out flat, they round the upper corners to simulate the smaller diameter of the planet, something I forgot about, so I had to move my NW continent over a thousand miles or so. Handy Links: * Donjon: The aforementioned map generator/random everything generator site. * D20SRD: Another version of the map generator; same software, just runs a little faster. * National Hurricane Center Latitude/Longitude Distance Calculator: Just what it says - plug in two coordinates and find the (approximate) distance. * Circumference of the Earth at given latitudes. * Worldbuilding Stack Exchange: "[A] question and answer site for writers/artists using science, geography and culture to construct imaginary worlds and settings." * World Climate Index: Climate info for 149 countries. Handy if you're basing a nation on something real-world.
I suppose I should preface this with some background info. I write fantasy. I've been into fantasy since I was kid, though I have done some normal fiction and even urban fantasy over the years. This world, which I call Venosea (ve-NOH-see-uh), isn't the first of its kind. In high school, I created a world - a continent, really - where I could set my stories. It was your standard fantasy world (elves, dwarves, dragons, undead, and a magic system that was undefined at best), and it wasn't very well designed - unnaturally straight shorelines, odd features that were just tossed in for the hell of it (a ring of mountains penning in the ubiquitous evil being, e.g.), and all the city/nation names were chosen from the same pool of bland fantasy blah I'd thought up. I had some really basic info on some of the nations (like government, industries, and such), a bunch of towns and cities on a map, and not much else; I only came up with things as I needed them, which meant pretty much only the areas where the action occurred were ever developed. I set one initial novel there, then expanded on the world, creating new characters and new stories. After a second novel and a handful of short stories (both finished and not), I realized that it was kind of stupid and set it aside. A couple years after college, I came up with a new story idea. I needed a new world, so I jotted down some ideas for nations, races, and such, and then (being the pantser I am), I wrote the first eight or ten pages in a notebook before I'd even figured out a real plot. Life also got in the way, and I forgot about it for awhile; additionally, I'd lost interest in writing after college, so I just let it languish. Despite all that, this concept wouldn't let me go - every so often I'd pull it out and tinker with things as I was inspired with new ideas, but it never really went anywhere until the summer of 2015, when one scene popped into my head and wouldn't get out. I finally sat down and wrote it out, and it got me motivated to working on the story in earnest. Four months later, I had almost 70K words (only 8K of which were at the beginning), a rough map, and something of a plot... and at that point, I realized that I had to put it all on hold to flesh out the world. Yippee.