/wbg/ - Worldbuilding General

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I feel i might want giants, but my setting is low fantasy.
is there a non-magic justification for their existance?

Otherwise I already have a species of spider monkeys acting as the dwarf/halfling/gnome equivalent, so I could just have intelligent gorillas they call giants but aren't necessarily giants to humans

>>49951169
Big things need a lot of food, and if their size is unnecessary for survival (and makes them need more food) it will slowly be decreased by natural selection or not evolve in the first place.

My giants evolved alongside humans in firm symbiosis throughout human history, humans grow food for the giants and the giants build walls and protect the humans. It was in the best interest of the humans to feed the giants well and help them to selectively breed to get them even larger.

There are quite a few ways to get giants to work:
>Other races help feed them, like what I did
>They hibernate or spend lots of time dormant and not using energy
>They have efficient metabolisms and can store huge amounts of energy for later use
>They have a vast and reliable source of food (you'll need to explain why humans don't use it)
>Magic (not recommended)

>>49951169
Do they really need to be justified if there's no magic?

The only thing one would know about giants is that they're big, eat a lot, and should be avoided.

>>49951260
did yours split from humans through selection, like did the tribes always have the two tallest people mate until they became a noticeably different subset of human?
or did they evolve seperately and meet somewhere down the line?

>>49951316
my group is entirely engineers. we like arguing feasibility.
"a wizard/god did it" is accepted as an answer but leaves a sour taste in everyone's mouths

How difficult is it to ascend to omnipotence in your setting, /wbg/?
>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?

>>49951355
magic and life force are the same. You can make yourself young again, but that would shave off a lot of your life.
You can add to your mana pool if you steal from something elses, and there's long-lived livestock and plants raised to act as wells

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got any not-horse mounts in your setting?

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>>49951260
>>49951169
Also funny you should mention gorillas, I based the intelligence, behavior, and communication of my giants off of gorillas like koko. Innocent but strong, capable of basic listening and sign language, repeating what they are taught but rarely creating new ideas.

>>49951321
They are biologically far removed from humans with an unexplained origin, and the first intelligent race to walk the land, before humans surviving on massive herds that have been wiped out. They range from 12 to 15 feet tall. Their skin is a thick wrinkled gray-red hide and their faces are quite empty (pic is an okay reference). When the humans came along and sprouted civilization, very few giants survived without coming to the humans. The violent ones were culled (humans had the numbers to survive against giants) while the docile ones were nurtured in exchange for protection and construction. They've become more intelligent and they can take orders and speak through sign language because of humans, but sending them to an offensive war can confuse and corrupt them because they distinguish friends from foes by symbols and words, so an enemy can easily trick a giant into attacking its own army.

>>49951460
>They are biologically far removed from humans with an unexplained origin, and the first intelligent race to walk the land, before humans surviving on massive herds that have been wiped out.
This got messed up somehow

They are biologically far removed from humans with an unexplained origin, and the first intelligent race to walk the land, before humans they survived on massive herds that have been wiped out.

>>49951417
Snails.
Their shells are incredibly light, so they are pretty fast.
Also once a month it can shoot a dart with the force of a canon.

11 nations too many for a fantasy setting the size of the continental United States?

>>49951519
It depends how many you're using. I have over 70 nations but most are background lore to expand the world and they haven't been fleshed out at all.

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>>49951519
not really. depends on what you want out of your nations

>>49951417
Whumps.
Sort of a cross between a mule and a camel with twice the endurance and stamina.

On the downside, they're stubborn as all hell so a trained one tends to cost an arm and a leg.

>>49951519
United States are pretty big. I think it would fit just fine. Probably to few, actually.

I have a bunch of ideas for a setting but don't know what to do to start putting everything down. what do i do guys?

>>49952760
Just put them down and try to justify them and see how it goes. I discovered some of more interesting ideas for myself in trying to justify my original ideas.

>>49952760
I use a map. I'm keen to my own hints and symbolism that other people can't really read, I can record the culture and safety of a location on a map by its shape and biome colors as well as the town names. When I have a decent idea I alter or add a spot on the map with subtleties that contain the idea, from there I slowly develop the region more and more turning it from a shallow placeholder to something full.

I constantly add and cut things to condense it to something that contains the best ideas while those that don't work are clipped off.

>>49951519
>>49951644
>>49952691
>11 nations too many for a fantasy setting the size of the continental United States?
It depends a bit on the how much your fantastical magic/tech enables travel and communication... but for typical, low-tech fantasy worlds, 11 nations in an area the size of the US is probably on the light side.

Just look at Europe for most of its recorded history... It's a comparable land area, and today, Europe's got about 45-ish countries (there's a few grey areas), plus a handful of other "city state" level entities like the Vatican, Monaco and San Marino. There were historical periods where a major empire managed to capture the lion's share of that, but in other periods there were many, many more sovereign nations, with a lot of the large countries like France, Britain and Germany cut up into four or more pieces.

Number of countries you're likely to have comes down to a combination of geography and technology (or magic). Large empires around the Mediterranean were possible because sea travel enabled comparatively fast travel and communication. Technology (e.g. trains) allowed the US to effectively govern a large area. By the same token, separate populations are more likely to create effective borders at natural barriers to travel, like mountains and rivers.

>>49953030
>separate populations are more likely to create effective borders at natural barriers to travel, like mountains and rivers

>>49951644
The map of native american tribes is a perfect example of this, but population is also a factor. It's easier to govern a sparsely populated area than a densely populated one. Populations tend to flourish in the fertile coastal areas, and in the US those regions are also mountainous, leading to lots and lots of small nations. In the plains, a nomadic lifestyle was the norm (and travel uninhibited) so groups like the Crow and Ute were able to control large areas.

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>>49951169

Giants are just big humans, anon. Big, intelligent gorillas would just be as contrived.

Go look up filename. He's done a couple similar paintings for his 'giant slaves' idea

>>49951169
>is there a non-magic justification for their existance?

All kinds of megafauna have existed before. Most likely justifiable as an evolutionary trait, assuming there is large enough game for them to hunt.

>>49951519
No, considering nation-states have existed and the Holy Roman Empire was made out of 60-something states that were states but were part of the empire and somesuchshit.

If anything, it is too few.

>>49951169
>>49951260
> Giants!
Big things DO need a lot of food, but it's certainly possible for a typical ecosystem to support at least some megafauna. Most fantasy giants don't have significantly larger mass than a modern elephant, and of course many known dinosaurs were many times that size. Energy consumption is a consideration, certainly, but I don't see it as a major limitation. Thinking about large animals on earth, there are really two things you need to think about:

1) Body Type - in an earth-like environment, without a magic loophole, simply "scaling up" human anatomy is not plausible. The relative sizes of body parts do not scale linearly with size (what's known as the "square-cube law"). A mosquito isn't built like a cat, a cat isn't built like a horse, and a horse isn't built like an elephant. For starters, the limbs and torso on a giant should be proportionately much thicker than on a human.

2) Competition - humans tend to be alpha hunters in every ecosystem they enter (and exploit). Historically, this includes using their technological superiority to hunt competing species to extinction, including (maybe especially) those that are physically superior. How do your giants manage to compete successfully with humans for resources?

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the giants in my setting are a mix between the celtic britons of antiquity and the vikings of late antiquity and earlier middle ages.

They live on a large Island(that's pretty much the british isles mixed with the nordic countries.) called Fathalahm.

In the north of Fathalahm it is mountainous and cold, even in the summer temperatures can be quite cool in the mountains. to the south, it is more hilly, slowly transitioning into rolling grassland(like bumpy prairies, I guess). there it is much warmer.

many of the things foreigners say about Fathalahm is that the forests are beautiful and the weather is wetter than a drunken uncle. This is because(much like real life britain) the rainy season is cool and rainy, and the summer season is sunny, fluctuating between warm and cool. in the first half of fall, the weather is nice. warm and sunny, short days and pretty colorful leaves. the second have is shite though. wet, wet, wet. the first half of winter is rainy in the morning, frosty in the after noon. second half is a blanket of thin snow(think five to eight centimeters in our measurements for most of the island, and twelve to twenty in the mountains.)

Also, the giants are only about three meters tall. Compared to the average human who is just a smidge under two meters tall, they're quite sizable.

Also, when I was done with writing some stuff in my setting's antiquity(fantasy version of the Persian Wars, fantasy version of Alexander's Conquests, fantasy version of Roma empire, ect) i was going to write a whole thing about Fathalhi Raiders(think vikings), coming to loot the coasts of the mainland. Then, their would be a holy war declared on the giants and a few nations would join into a pact to defeat them. But everyting falls apart as soon as the humans invade Fathalahm.

would you like to know more?

>>49951355
>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
You can become a Vampire or an Android, both are bad choices in the long run as you become either a slave to a god or a controller.
>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?

Actual, naturally born magicians are nearly extinct. They presumably once had increadle power but it's left intentionally ambiguous as to how powerful they actually were.
>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
The deities don't really bother with mortal concerns. The earth spirits are the ones who make sure the world isn't destroyed.
>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
No, tearing a hole in reality like that never ends well for the average person.

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>>49951417
I'm still debating on whether I want to use vulture-like terror birds or giant hyenas in my desert setting. Maybe I'll use some kinda dune-surfing boats instead.

>>49951417
That aren't machines?
Koatl Lizards and Elephants.

>>49953430
>Most fantasy giants don't have significantly larger mass than a modern elephant, and of course many known dinosaurs were many times that size.

Most of the large ones were either herbivores, or adapted to hunt said herbivores, though. Polar bears/sabertooth tigers are probably the largest carnivores. Of course, if the giants are omnivores with a significant part of their diet being from plants, or there is other megafauna for them to hunt, it should work out. Of course, if they are smart enough to farm/herd/domesticate animals, more or less a moot point.

>How do your giants manage to compete successfully with humans for resources?

Just make all humans lactose-intolerant and the giants not.

>>49953569
>would you like to know more?
no, and truth be told i already know more than I would like.
If you have to say the name of your setting, you've already lost the war with conservation of detail

>>49951644
That's actually north america after colonization (by groups originally from China)

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>>49953915

>>49953812
that's not the name of the setting, that's the name of the island(sub-continent, whatever. It's big, anyhow)

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>>49953996
>not name of setting
>it's the name of a place

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What's the executive summary/elevator pitch for your world?

>sino-celt collapsing empire discovers soldier-versus-warrior clash of ideals

>>49954225
>Bunch of human nations we-wuzing as fantasy races fighting WWI with magic and unethical science

>>49954225
Merchant princes from Venice have to deal with racial tension against Mongolian working class. There's also people who killed and ate their god.

>>49954225
>Nuclear Apocalypse after Atom Bomb invented in WWI

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>>49954225
world war 1, except in space

>>49954284
>>49954322
>>49954340
>WW1 three times in a row

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>>49951355
>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
There are a couple; it's a Noble Bright world of heroes and demi-gods.
The better a spellcaster you are, the slower you age. If you reach the peak of magical ability you've reached magical immortality, and all it'll take is some top-grade healing magic to reverse the aging process.
There's also ways that don't involve spellcasting, like becoming Undead, having your soul stuffed in an Automaton's soulstone, or transcending to "Outsider" status.

>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
The strongest Wizard in history can perform some limited reality warping, but it's all ritualized and consumes an enormous amount of life-force and ambient magic. As for a "Wish", a similarly powerful spellcaster can put in a request to the Creator to intervene in some way, with obvious limitations.

>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
Plenty of demi-gods already exist, one of which is a self-righteous Wizard who calls himself the Warden.

>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
It's almost required for most demi-gods to have some manner of personal plane, usually as a secret base. Pieter Volans in particular hasn't left his plane in centuries.

Pic related, demi-god chillin' in a personal plane.

>>49954225
>Giants, vampirism, "magic" alchemical items affect humanity's development greatly from the beginning rather than just being accessories. Architecture develops MUCH faster due to giants, vampires quickly get a stranglehold over society, wild vampires ruin rural life and push farming into defended/walled rural communities where the vampire overlords collect blood taxes, which causes people to start hating vampires and overthrow the royals which fucks everything up and effectively creates medieval post-apocalypse, also an extremely limited amount of WW1 technology fluked into the world to go through lots of abuse by the people trying to use it

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>>49954366
Hey, it's a fascinating subject. Lots of things you can do with it.

>>49954225
Dwarves are subterranean psychos worshipping volcanoes and setting them to erupt intentionally.

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>>49954394
that sounds like a neat plot

>>49951355
>>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
Yes. You need to kill your god and steal his power. Your form will change a bit (Like you become bald and unhealthily pale) but you won't wittle or anything.
>>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
Stealing from god would give you some major reality-altering powers, but even gods themselves can't alter the very fabric. Regular magic users are however pretty low on power scale.
>>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
After the first god-killing incident they mostly went into hiding. They also aren't very smart or aware, despite being powerful and their powers can not directly target those who don't worship them. God-eaters are smarter, more aware and have more agency, even if they are weaker.
>>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
Nobody gets to create any kind of planes.

>>49954366
BC WWII's been abused to shit.

>>49954367
We need to write out some definite rules for worldbuilding.

>1: Unless given an insurmountable reason not to, intelligent species will live EVERYWHERE.
>2: Rivers *merge* while flowing downstream towards the sea, and only split to form a delta.
>3: If your setting cannot withstand Karl Pilkington existing within it, your setting cannot exist.
>etc.

>>49951355
WWI Atom bomb guy here.

>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
Only one guy in the setting could be functionally immortal, and that required him to be permanently trapped in an iron lung wheelchair. The guy is utterly miserable, in constant pain, and desperately wants to die already but his family keeps him around because he's the only one smart enough to keep old tech working and the family business running.
>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
The only trace of magic is oraclery and vision-quests, and it's left up to imagination whether that's real magic or esoteric bullshit.
>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
N/A but some people are convinced the Sun is the eye of whatever created the world and at the end of every day it resets the world again with minor alterations.

>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
N/A

>>49951355
>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
The pre-vampire and his first generation live forever, vampires below that die from the transformation but they live long depending on their generation.
Wizards can prolong their lives. What makes a wizard a wizard is their best-kept secret, however they slowly lose interest and intentionally suppress their powers, think like using cheat codes. It ruins the game.

>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
They haven't done anything cool in the real world for a long time, mostly just personal miracles and pretty lights. All of the significant magic goes on in other realms that wizards created (where magic is stronger), they occasionally have turf wars but most just isolate themselves on their territory, hopefully with a few friends. During the Wayward Ages when magic was at its strongest and Earth ran on a parallel timeline to the outer realms, wizards created most of the "magic" stuff on Earth like monsters. Most of what they did has been buried or became natural, so it's hard to tell how powerful they really were.

>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
Not anymore, the most powerful wizard (completely uncontested) hasn't stood up from his chair or used any magic in millennia and he doesn't have any goals or agenda. He killed the other god-wizards long ago. The second strongest made a huge cave on Earth one time and created vampires but that was about it, he can't even control the vampires anymore.

>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
As previously stated, 99% wizards are chilling and quarreling in other planes and most can't go back to Earth anymore because their life-suspending magic would weaken and kill them.

>>49954540
>2: Rivers *merge* while flowing downstream towards the sea, and only split to form a delta.

Bifurcation also happens outside deltas. See Divide Creek, Nkusi and Nerodimka. It's just extremely rare.

I'm trying to make a sensible, but diverse planet for the setting I'm working out, but I don't know how to begin. Anyone have ideas, especially with how to simulate stuff like plate tectonics? I don't want to just have a random smattering of crap on the map; I seriously want it to have some integrity.

Am I terrible for wanting that? Or is this a normal thing for settings to have stuff like this baked into the background?

>>49954895
Dorf Fortress?

>>49951519

It's rather small. Best solution to avoid having to paint ten billion principalties like in the HRE is to have de-centralized macro entities that you can refer to ("the Celts") instead of a billion tribes to keep track of (the Aedui, the Arverni, the Casse, the Belgae, ect.). To help offer a realistic sense of pre-modern pre-nation state decentralization, let's imagine a tiered system:

>Stage 1: Continental (European, Asian, Middle Eastern referring to West Asian and Egyptian).
For our template example - European.

>Stage 2: Regional (Iberian, Slavic, Germanic, Romance-Latins, Italians, Nordic, Semitic, Iranian in the ethnic sense from Azeris to Tajiks and Pashtuns). Modern day is your region or ethnic group.
For our template example - Italian.

>Stage 3: National or Pseudo-national (Persian, Median, Arab, Pashtuns, Franks, Visigoths, Ostrogoths, Aragonese, Portuguese, Dorian or Ionian Greek, Ghassanid or Lakhmid). Modern day is your country.
For our template example - Latin (at the time of the Roman republic)

Stage 4: Sub-national (Athenian, Spartan, tribal confederacies like the Ghassanids/Lakhmids, the Durrani and Ghilzai Pashtuns). Modern day is your region within a country, your state for us burgers.
For our template example - Roman (at the time of the Roman republic)

Stage 5: Tribal (the specific tribes, the city they belong to). Usually the city or county for modern day.
For our template example - Cornelia.

So we've got a character, Marcus Cornelius Avitus. He's a European, Italian, Latin, Roman of the Cornelia family.

You don't have to plan for all five for all your characters. Nor do you need all five for even a main character. Post limit so lemme continue.

>>49954861
A general rule seeks to define, like, >90% of circumstances. It's still a good rule for worldbuilding.

>>49954225
Orc tribe finds ancient Dwarf city in the desert, stop being nomadic and settle near it. Have to fight whatever's inside the ruins for cool shit as well as anyone else that wants the cool shit, be they other tribes, those industry-craved not-Helghast Elves, or [whatever else].

>>49951260
>They have a vast and reliable source of food (you'll need to explain why humans don't use it)

What is "the giants", Alex?

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>How difficult is it to ascend to omnipotence in your setting, /wbg/?
Probably impossible as the sun likely wouldn't enjoy the competition. Divinity? Yeah sure, takes a rather long time though.

>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
Reliable? Not so much, but paths do exist. The Aedda, a race that on average lives 24 years, speak of the wisest elders living 10 fold that. Technically the treeple, who really need a better name, cannot die of old age alone by default.
>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
It is a pretty high magic setting, though that comes more from accessibility and quantity than from power. Technically once the treeple grow into just plain ole trees, they begin to bend reality around themselves to their will in their endless dreams.
>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
It's largely all local, but yes. The landfall was caused by a godly smack down.
>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
Nope, the only other plane of reality (unless you call my world planes which some have) was discovered via teleportation magic. You generally avoid it if you can, never travel without a group. Do not be lead astray by the eyes.

I'm probably not working on the doodle tonight, so I'll throw that in if anyone has suggestions or questions (or I won't, fucking hell I had one job).

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Is it even possible to make bug humanoids that don't look creepy and gross as fuck?

Moths don't count.

>>49954225
>Smei-generic fantasy world gets invaded by aliens

>>49957668
>tons of/huge eyes
>giant mandibles
>insect appendages in general

g-good luck

>>49957668
I don't think you can avoid the gross angle, but maybe you can go for the "Ugly but also kind of cute" way.

>>49951417
Dinosaurs of all sorts are used as assorted mounts and beasts of burden by pseudo-nomadic elves.

>>49954225
Collapse of the Roman Empire in the early middle ages, except with dinosaurs, elves, and kung-fu lizardmen that live on the bottom of the sea.

>>49954895
It's hard to actually map spheres if you don';t have a globe to do it on. Try doing it with just one or two continents at a time-ish. For tectonic plates, scribble some psuedo-random shapes and decide which ones will be continenetal and which ones will be oceanic. Figure out which way the paltes are moving, and whether they're subducting or what have you. go from there.

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Currently my races are;
>Hobgoblins
>Flock (Sheep People)
>Humans
>Ogre/Oni

Is this enough races? i don't know if it feels 'balanced' enough yet, I don't want too many redundant races but at the same time I want the setting to feel diverse.

>>49957976
It really depends, I think it's better to have an idea of what niches you want filled, and then fit races to that rather than throwing in ideas you like with no place to put them.

Describe what role each of these races fill anon, also, does race=culture in your setting? Do the races intermingle at all?

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>>49957668
Base them on caterpillars.
Hutt-like body structure, but the tail doesn't taper to a point and remains stubby and rounded.

>>49954225
humanity was originally on all 4 inner worlds, which at first orbited saturn.

shapeshifters from jupiter invaded and caused the aliens that lived on saturn to throw the 4 inner worlds into their current orbit.

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>>49958012

I want all the 'main' niches to be filled. Big strong guys, little sneaky guys, I guess the nerdy/bookish types. (Probably humans, in this case).

The Hobgoblins are mean little imperialists, but their sights are not set on any of the other 'big folk'. Literally created by Heaven itself to stem the tide of goblins, the hobgoblins are slavers. Morality in this world is literally that enslaving goblins is a good thing, they are literally happier when enslaved, and its the only way for the goblins to get into the afterlife. Otherwise they don't even have a 'soul'. The hobgoblins compared to other races though are small and compact, big enough to dominate goblins but small enough to chase them into their burrows.

The flock are the pastoral, friendly and amicable beings in the setting. The idea here is animal sheep do not exist, but the flock do, and therefore all the cloth produced in the setting is made in no small part by the flock themselves. Not quite as cowardly as real sheep but easily swayed by friends and family.

The Ogres I have less material on but I'd like to imagine something a bit more noble or at least thoughtful then generic big dumb orc brutes.

Humans as I said are always a bit generic, but I really like the idea of making them the more magically inclined, scholarly race. All about books; Sharp eyes to read text, slender fingers to write it, and a appetite for knowledge to fill them.

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>>49958227
Could go the Shrek direction with Ogres.

Solitary, ill-tempered, and crass, but will genuinely try their best to do the right thing and make loyal friends or companions.

They tend to live by themselves widely spaced out because their own stubbornness tends to make long-term ogre communities fall apart.

>>49954225
>Lewis and Clark colonize the Not!Underdark

>>49958329
This unironically sounds really great.

>>49958344
Do they get a Drow Sacagawea?

>>49958364
TY friend!

To be honest, Shrek Ogres had some badass powers back when it was a kids' book.
>Stare of death
>Poison breath
>Deadly toxic even to poison snakes

Utter badasses

>>49958421
Drow don't exist actually, basic premise is X apocalyptic event happens on the surface and makes it inhospitable. So it forces the survivors underground where they discover the "Great below", and the players are part of expedition teams to scout out the new territory. There will be Moth people though.

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>>49958329
>>49958364
>>49958421

The personality is fine, but I'll try to skip on the memes, thanks.

>>49958535
I'm sure that's what they were intending, I doubt they're asking you to add literal fedora tipping ogres into your world.

Where can I indulge in collaborative worldbuilding outside of /tg/?

>>49958914
This interests me as well

>>49958914
Reddit

>>49958561
<3

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>>49958535
Nice oni friend. Here's mine

Eh. Maybe a nod to 'em here and there for the lulz, but I didn't mean full on memeage.

>>49958561
YOU DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO NERD

But yeah pic was not related.

>>49958528
Moth Sacagawea?

>>49959127
r/worldbuilding

This ded?

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>>49957668
Fluffy moths, anon.

>>49959758
More of a rotting corpse held up by a few strings and someone's hand jammed up it like a grisly puppet show, but yeah.

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>>49959865
>Moths don't count
B8?

>>49957668
Also Spiderwick has some good shit

>>49959904
Lovely image op.

Shame, I never got to talk at length about my own shitty project

>>49959918
Just trying to convince anon to rethink his position on moth-folk.

>>49959931
I mean not talking about it isn't going to liven things up any.

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>>49960007
Eh what the hell.
You want the abridged version or the full fluff?

>>49960066
If you toss out the abridged people could ask more questions.

>>49960117
Roighto.

The world as we know it is covered in sprawling desert rife with bandits, beasts, and horrors beyond description. In this harshest of environments, only small pockets of civilization can sustain themselves, the largest of which are lumped together colloquially as “The Three Cities”; three fervently isolationist urban bastions. Together, their refuse feeds the trade of the outer Wasteland.

>>49960166
Arabia?

(cont.)
The history of the world has been lost, forgotten and neglected, both from the eroding sands of time and indifference of a people most concerned with survival, yet a few scraps of forgotten history remain stowed away in ruins and darkened rooms. With the exception of the Firstfolk, all residents of the Desert are actually descendants of colonists from a land across the seas. Originally, much of the coastland was fertile and green, but increased demand for food to feed the explosive population of their mother countries led to the colonies overfarming, literally turning the land to dust. On top of this, a conflict written of only as the Great War broke out between the nations of the Old World, who threw their teeming populations at one another with little regard for lives lost, effectively putting a meat grinder to the masses. Eventually, the war came to a great standstill, with the advent of trenches and mechanized infantry creating a war of attrition that slowly ebbed away at these once proud nations.
When an experimental weapon was developed with the promise of putting a swift and bloody end of the conflict, war-weary governments put it into action without question. No one can say for sure what the nature of this terrible weapon was, but mere days after its deployment all contact between the Old World and its colonies was cut abruptly off. Whatever messengers were sent to spread news of the fate of the Old World did not make it through the journey, or else were laughed off as raving madmen and died in obscurity.
Now, hundreds of years later, after the descendants of colonies have forgotten their origins completely, echoes of the Old World rise ominously in volume. Strange things have occurred around the continent’s coastline, rumours of seaborne monsters and horrid plagues that strike without warning in the night spread like wildfire throughout the desert. Something big is coming; whatever killed the Old World is creeping its way across the seas…

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>>49951519
>>49953277
HRE map for reference

>>49951355
Omnipotence is pretty much out of the question.

>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
Immortality is difficult/impossible to achieve, depending on how you define it. There have been a few people throughout history in Saddath-Leng (not!Orient) who have been able to slow or stop aging through alchemical means, but they still die from violence and since this process is basically a more extreme version of Mithridatism, most of the people who attempt it succumb to the poisons they ingest and end up dying.

You've also got the prince of the Machine State and his inner circle of nobles, but their mode of "immortality" is more like biomechanical undeath, and even the Prince doesn't know the extent of their resilience to injury.

>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
Pretty weak, desu senpai. There is nothing like wish magic or any other magic where a single spell could have worldwide effects. The spookiest stuff you'll get with magic is mind reading and semi-accurate prophesy.

>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
Not really, no. The gods in this world are basically just memetic constructs with only minimal influence over the material world, and only in connection with their believers.

>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
There's no way to create a new plane, and the only plane other than the normal material world is fundamentally incapable of supporting habitation due to a lack of natural light and organic materials.

>>49960178
>>49960166

Now that is giving me a hell of a nausicaa vibe to it. Which I like given I'm trying to give my current setting a pretty heavy Ghibli vibe to it.

Now about these beasts and horrors?

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>>49957668
I know you said moths don't count, but you can still borrow elements from moths and use them in a different way. Namely, the fur - you can cover up a lot of the little gross details of bugs by hiding them under fluff and fur.

You can also go with >>49958153 this kind of idea and have them very simple and smooth with a kind of stylized face where colour markings make their faces look cuter than they are.

>>49960296
Monsters are currently being developed, but I would prefer to keep them mysterious and rare, with traces of the weapon's effects on the wildlife.

For example; Skindogs
A recent phenomenon amongst the desert's wild dog population is a disturbing and hideous birth defect occurring with worrying regularity.

Once in a blue moon a litter of pups is born hairless and with patches of skin missing from their twisted bodies. The pain, of course, is hideous, and drives them to vicious madness that often leads them to turn upon their mother in the first moments of their life.

These monstrosities are short lived, lasting only a month or so before succumbing to the failure of its underdeveloped organs, but they somehow manage to thrive despite this.
For one, the Skindogs undergo puberty only days after their birth, reaching adulthood within the week. Another odd feature of this bastard species is an uncanny resilience to damage. Their pain-addled minds are so clouded that the beasts will continue to snap and leap at their prey long after a normal dog's body would have given out. Additionally, any wounds incurred will heal rapidly, whole chunks of missing flesh filled in with seemingly benign tumours and growths.

So yeah.
Not very friendly.

And then there's The Stranger...

>>49957976
>>49958227
this is just my taste, but i find when settings have only a single anthromorphic animal type race and no others it feels kind of... unfinished i guess. why are only sheep sapient enough to be a major race? what happened to other intelligent animals like raccoons and stuff?

if it's just that you like sheep and thought they'd make a cool race, that's totally fine, but for me it feels like there is an underlying logic i'm searching for but can't find.

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>>49960385
>>49959865
>>49959918
You don't even need moths for this.

Just model the bug-people off of the orchid mantis. It's basically the K-Pop star of the insect world.

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i think i posted a wip of this a long time ago, but anyway these are some drawings i did for one of the countries for my low fantasy world. they're kind of a not!France, but with more of a goth/corvid theme, and a pagan witch-based religion.

>>49960732
Did you draw those character pics?

I like the art style.

>>49960749
thanks, yeah i drew them

>>49953607
If you're going for realism, the birds would make a lot more sense than hyenas.

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>>49954225
Ancient Mediterranean fantasy with two coastal superpowers locked in a tense naval cold war, complete with proxy battles in the less advanced mainland tribes and kingdoms, espionage, privateering / state-sponsored piracy, etc.

Corsair activity goes wild under these conditions.

A secret society in an old wealthy trade kingdom (inspired by Mesopotamia and the Malian Empire) strives to keep the two superpowers at odds with one another, but not go all-out war; the status quo helps them all get rich.

The preceding civilization was advanced as fuck, with clipper ships and leonardo da vinci flying machines, but they got rekt but some kind of cataclysm. Myths about a massive sea god tearing everything up get passed down, similar to flood myths in real life. Current tech level is similar to 200 BC.

And sea serpents / monsters are actually 60-70 ft long aggressive seals.

That's the nutshell version. Ideally it'll be the setting for a bunch of short stories that tie into a single overarching story, but until then it's really more mental exercise than anything.

>>49960390
>And then there's The Stranger...
Alright coy boy, elaborate like we all know you want to.
>>49960423
I've got the excuse of the fennec like Aedda developing on their own planetoid. A planetoid were the ability to mingle with the Aether is a very potent survival mechanism. Just as human's tool use and wit have placed them as the dominant species on their world, so too has the Aedda's ability to weave the world's magic (although they're dominant position is significantly more tenuous).

Though too be fair I haven't decided if I'd like any other awoken/raised animal races, but I like the current set up of tool and tech humans, magical animals, and nature manipulating treeple.

Man is the most artificial and least magical, the Aedda are the intermediates, and the treeple are full blown natural mystics.
Everything follows this pattern.
Man is the most common and can easily adapt to new environments, spreading them about the aether's islands. The Aedda could easily out populate humans if not for their stubborn and traditional culture keeping them largely on their home world (that and they don't handle cold even remotely well, and the Aetheric sea is freezing). The treeple live very long lives, but their reproduction is one of those once in a blue moon mysteries of nature things, more nature spirits than proper creatures.

I wouldn't know where I'd fit other creatures into that right now and keep the same dynamic going.

>>49954225
Modern humanity discovers "magic". Cue golden age, leading to overuse, leading to everything exploding and ripping holes in reality. Now demons are invading. Power armored Knights Templar now fight off demons, mutant Morlocks, and alien angels.

>>49961056
wait, are you the same anon who has the flock race or someone else?

it seems like you have a certain paradigm about how you want races to fit into your setting based on what narrative/game balance roles you want them to play, and it seems like you've though about it quite a bit, so that's cool.

that's a totally fair and valid way to approach worldbuilding, but i would just offer that sometimes it's also nice to have little flairs and oddities that don't fit perfectly into a paradigm of balanced roles. world are messy and it's ok to have anomalies and outliers here and there. that's just my take anyway.

>>49961257
I am not, just another anon with but a single animal race. Fair enough point about outliers, I'm just not entirely sure how I would go about one at this stage.

Though I have been considering adding in a race of aetheric beings, or perhaps a sort of mixture between that idea and what would otherwise be normal life if not for their soul being over-ridden/replaced by such a being.

At least for now the big three are the planned player races though, but I am always open to the idea of someone wanting to play something out of my bestiaries if it's intelligent enough.

how would you fit moon worship into a religion (or just, the moon as the main symbol of a worshipped god)?

>>49961479
The moon brings its white light to cleanse the dark of night. Without it, you'd have but the illumination of the stars, very dim indeed. The empty dark of moonless nights are cold, lonely, and frightening.

It's also like a mini sun, so there is always potential for younger sibling, child, or other relative/mate to the sun.

>>49960732
man, I really love your wip work stuff. Keep doing what you're doing!

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>>49961820
thanks. i'm also working on a comic set in the same world.

>>49962325
gdamn that's pretty neat.

>>49953607
>how big would a bird have to be to scare you?
>I don't know like 100 ft tall

Any rational explanations for floating mountains other than Avatar-level magnetic field handwavium?

>>49962458
Conflux of elemental air. They float but the path to them is churning with heavy wind currents and storms.

The islands aren't floating, the earth shrank/heavy erosion. The mountain is made from the same mineral immovable rods are made from.

>>49962458
Even attempts at technological/scientific explanations are going to be so extrapolatory that they are basically handwavium, so just go for it. The best you can do is give enough rules and constraints to it that the consequences are interesting enough to make it worth the leap.

>>49962458
Pockets of super helium within them or some other lighter than air element involved? If you went the lighter than air magic stone route, and I'm not just saying that because I'm the airship guy and magic floating stones are a perfect excuse for airships.
But I am saying it for that reason.

Also can you imagine how extreme mining the very mineral that keeps a mountain afloat would be?

Anyone have any resources regarding the creation of cities? I am having wondering how I should go about creating and making them feel distinct from one another.

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>>49962521
Fuck it, stole my own idea. Brought to you by the Fuck'n wut WIP space, the shattered lands. Broken by some great celestial happenings long before anyone even thought to think about it (or much else really).

What is known is that wasn't inhabited by much more than the same sort of small critters you'd find on the earth like planetoid I am really trying to restrain myself from calling Aerth. Which would suggest a shared past, or at the very least an identical creation. Though it lacks much life in its seas, now little more than puddles having drained into the abyss (this is also the reason behind all of the desertification).

There is currently a great deal of interest in the crumbling islands of the shattered lands. All those collisions lead to the exposure of some rather lucrative veins within the exposed earthen cores.

Not shown on my incredibly low def "map" are the rope bridges which now connect various islands, some little more than wire lines with hand drawn carts attached via pulley. More stable bridges would be built, but you see the combination of unstable orbital rotation and the hilariously turbulent remnants of the original atmosphere make more solid construction impossible.

Many lose their lives seeking fortune amongst these precarious rocks.

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>>49957668
Crabs. Also, they tend to look a lot less threatening when actually wearing some kind of clothing, makes them look more like a civilised being rather than a monster.

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>>49954225
The world is fairly light in tone, but not overly so. It's similar to our Earth in the 16th and 17th centuries sans gunpowder, with expansionistic empires, trade wars, and magic.

>>49963052
So like what exactly are you looking for.
I have the medivieval city guide.
The mediieval city
And fief/town.

>>49963661
Stellaris in general managed to make some good-looking aliens in arthopods and fungoid category.

>>49954225
Hideo Kojima Presents: Robots versus Cthulhus (but the real monster was man all along).

Trying to create a not!germany for a seafaring setting. In the Age of Sail is it possible to have iron ships with sails or Do they have to be wooden?
Das
I don't know if it works with iron ships.

>>49963875
A shame that the ships looked so generic, the molluscoids are the only ones that look at least semi-interesting.

>>49954225
Magic is religion, ancient wizards are deified and holy war is happening because of disagreement over elemental spell usage.

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So, in sci-fi setting, what would be less obvious consequences of people living on a planet with a very aggressive aquatic species who cannot move away from water for more than a kilometer?

Said monsters are not as big as i pic related, so they can freely swim in rivers and underground flooded caverns.

>>49957668
What's wrong with looking gross to humans?
I like me some ugly creatures

>>49954225
>Not!Europe is on the verge of scientific and magical Renaissance but radical gnostic necromancers ruin the magical part.

>>49960732
got any more about this culture and/or pics? Digging the art style and theme greatly.

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>>49964703
thank you. i don't have any more on this specific country yet, though they're kind of my pet country within the world so i'm planning to give them a lot more attention. but i did this other lineup a while ago for a neighbouring country (they have an england/france kind of thing going on). some of the names and symbols are outdated though.

>>49958914
RPGnet is actually pretty decent for this for the most part, lot of good settings have been thought up over there

>>49961056
Yessir.

So again, not everything's been worked out, but The Stranger is a mysterious being that wanders the desert (spotted mostly in the unlivable north heading due south towards civilization)
Though rumours conflict, it is commonly described as being covered up head to toe in tattered army fatigues, its face covered by an antique gas mask.
Attempts to great it are met with silence, and it doesn't even flinch at gunfire. Wherever it's going, it seems hell-bent on getting there above all else.

Remember how I said earlier that no messengers from the old world made it? Not quite true. The Stranger is what remains of an Old World soldier whose last order was to head to the New World with a dire warning. Although its body and mind have been corrupted by whatever nightmare Old World scientists cooked up, it clings on to this last memory as its one remaining shred of humanity.

>>49965000
I like it. There's a lot of potential in that idea for multiple different iterations. I'm guessing if gunfire doesn't bother it, that it's either been shot at or wandered through an active combat.

What happens to the people that get in its way?

>>49963806
I have them as well, I am looking more for inspiration on how to make the cities feel unique. For example, London and Berlin in the 17th century would have been different cities. Things like cultural events, style of dress and even the way the houses are built. I know I have seen some stuff about that in the aforementioned PDFs, but I am just wondering if there is any other resources out there or if anyone else here has any input.

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>>49960423
>>49961257

Flock Anon here. I was actually under the impression that having only a single animal person race made a setting feel a bit more unique or more completed. Multiple animal person settings can feel kind of crowded. Like why are there Crow People and wolf people and minotaurs but not for half of the other animals out there? Just seems a little strange to me.

Also, my races aren't necessarily forced into arbitrary narrative or game balance rules, but they should all have a 'reason to be'. Making all the races fit into similar niches seem unnecessary instead of keeping redundancy low.

I would have thought that using sheep people, which I don't really think has been done before, would supply the 'little flair' and 'oddities' that the race would need. I suppose not.

I am liking the idea of the crab people, and these ones here look really cool. >>49963661

>>49954225
>>49954366
WW1, except with Shark People versus Octopus people in a magical undersea adventure!

>>49954540
>Rules for worldbuilding
>Unless given an insurmountable reason not to, intelligent species will live EVERYWHERE.
Worth pointing out that population qualifies as an "insurmountable reason". People prefer to live in comfortable places with ready access to resources, and if those places aren't filled up yet, then there's no reason for people to try living in the crappy wasteland.

>Rivers *merge* while flowing downstream towards the sea, and only split to form a delta.
Assuming earth-like physical conditions, sure. If it's some Larry Niven wacky-planet, then not necessarily.

>>49957668
>Is it even possible to make bug humanoids that don't look creepy and gross as fuck?
Some people might be into that sort of thing.

China Mieville is into that sort of thing.

>>49965237
first off my comment about flair and oddities was directed at the other anon, not you, so don't take that as criticism or anything. and i was talking more in terms of how races fit into an idea of a balanced role paradigm, not aesthetics. aesthetically, sheepfolk definitely provide some of uniqueness and flavour.

> Like why are there Crow People and wolf people and minotaurs but not for half of the other animals out there?
that's very true, though i find that feeling is even more present when there's only a single animal race than say three like in your example. but it's also true that you can get carried away and before long just have a setting that's nothing but anthropomorphic animals.

let me revise my feedback a bit - it's not really the sheepfolk specifically, it just seems like the four races you listed have been picked randomly out of a hat. i don't really get a sense of cohesion of the setting just from looking at that list.

so actually before i try give any more feedback i'd like to know more about the settingn.
- why did you choose those four races?
- are there other minor/non-playable races in the setting or is it just those four?
- does the world have a particular aesthetic theme, like say cutesy noblebright, celtic folklore inspired, tolkienian, or is it like standard d&d fantasy?
- also, did you draw the sheepfolk pic?

>>49960423
>this is just my taste, but i find when settings have only a single anthromorphic animal type race and no others it feels kind of... unfinished i guess. why are only sheep sapient enough to be a major race? what happened to other intelligent animals like raccoons and stuff?
... That's like asking why there's a setting where only the monkey-descendants are sapient enough to be a major species. =)

I've always felt like it's a bit all-or-nothing with animal people. You can get your full Watership Redwall groove on and have animal people everywhere, or you can go with only humanoid / original intelligent species. But if you start mixing your classic fantasy with your classic myth, it just ends up feeling like a mash-up... which works, potentially, as humor or satire, but wears a little thin for anything "serious".

The only exception is really gameworlds, where a certain amount of unrealism is acceptable in the name of creating as many cool, playable species/forces as possible, and keeping them locked in the state of perpetual balanced conflict that the game requires.

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>>49965382

>Why did you choose those four races?
As stated before, I kind of wanted different sizes and people that fit the sizes. I also wanted each to be at least mildly unique in its 'phylum' so to speak; for lack of a better word. Having many flavors and elf or dwarf is very dull to me, so I preferred to distill each race into a core concept and fold redundant races into each other, for the most part.

>Are there are other Minor/NPC races in the setting or is it just those four?
Yes actually- I thought that to be very important actually to make the world feel more alive and deep. There are a race of Gnomes that are kind of meant to be the mixture of the fair folk and dwarves. Master Craftsmen that hide in the hidden places of the world. Other random oddities could be included later on.

Truth is I'm not *done* with the setting yet. Which is partially why I was asking about it in the first place.

>Does the world has a particular aesthetic theme?
Kind of. Much of the inspiration came from the OSR style blogs, ridiculous (but enjoyable) worldbuilding stuff on /tg/, elitism, contrarianism, and a whole lot of fantasy kitchen sink. As for actually lifting stuff from real life much of my inspiration came from Chinese myth and legend, which is where the entire Divine Bureaucracy thing in the setting is coming from. Not too Chinese though, just a little wink here and there.

I wanted the game world to feel alive and interesting, a "big" world that felt consistent. I didn't want to make it too grimdark edgy shit because I'm tired of it, but being too noblebright or 'comfy' makes the setting lack conflict, tension, and boring. I think a good mix would probably be better.

>Did you draw the sheepfolk pic
Hell no, wish I could draw like that. Finding sheepfolk pics that isn't a generic monster or porn is incredibly hard.

>>49965093
Yep. It just sort of shows up sometimes and nobody knows why. Some people think it's an omen of death or even the spirit of death itself.

As for people who get in its way...
Let's just say that people have learned to leave it well enough alone.

>>49965000
Cont.
Beneath the mask, The Stranger no longer resembles anything remotely like a man. Its flesh has slowly expanded, kept from bursting outwards only by the fragile confinement of its clothes. It's likely that when someone gets the chance to actually square up against it, it's true form will erupt from the hollow shell like a monstrous chrysalis.
Bit like this fella actually
https://youtu.be/1m_FqNhXKrM?t=65

>>49966929
>It's likely that when someone gets the chance to actually square up against it, it's true form will erupt from the hollow shell like a monstrous chrysalis.

So like is this a sex thing?

>>49967006
Wot? The vid?
Nah mun, dark souls boss that behaves similarly.

The idea is that it's been mutating all this time, but its gas mask and suit have kept that contained. So when someone finally breaches it, it'll be like opening a can of worms.

>>49967046
No, but like seriously. Is it a sex thing?

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Pretty soon I'm going to start working on designing an elaborate anatomy and organ system for a far-from-human race.

Their mouths are inside of their bodies, the head is only an entry point where food and objects have multiple paths they can go down. They have what can be called a built-in gas chromatogram to separate and analyze what they consume, and chemicals can be stored inside of numerous internal pouches for future use. A lot of water and chemicals (which I have yet to decide, majoring in chemistry at least) are kept to manage these processes. I plan to find some semi-plausible ways for them to produce and spew heat from chemical reactions or even spit acid as a rare defense mechanism. Their bodies will have to be extremely hardy and have diverse organ compositions to handle all of the harmful acids and bases flowing around, and the effect of internal injuries and health problems for the race would make human conditions look like nothing.

I don't have any specific questions, just looking for some tips and ideas.

>>49967131
No.
I wasn't thinking about sex when I made it anyway.

Could be some subconscious Freudian shit tho

>>49967166
Yeah you were. Come on, now.

>>49967198
Umm...

I need an adult?

>>49962458
>>49962521
>>49963542
I've played with the flying island thing, and... truth is, it's a bitch. I always loved that Skies of Arcadia / Castle in the Sky aesthetic, but it really only seems to work at that handwavey anime level of realism.

Getting the islands up there is actually not the biggest problem - it's stability. It's fairly easy to come up with (as one of the posters mentioned) some trapped gas or an element that is repulsed by gravity instead of attracted. Once you have a force to justify the levitation, it's just a question of how much.

The issue is, ok, now you've got floating rocks, which presumably rise to a height in the atmosphere where they're experiencing zero net buoyancy forces, based on how the ratio of normal and exotic-anti-grav matter in them. Cool. But at that point, what's keeping them fixed? Why aren't they all moving and crashing into eachother? Why don't they flip over? Why don't the sinking elements and floating elements separate over time, like oil and water? What is holding these things together in the long term (geological timespans)?

>>49967577
Magic, it works for Dalaran.

>>49967633
>Magic, it works for Dalaran.
The poster above requested flying islands without handwaving. I'd say "wizard did it" is probably handwaving in its most extreme form.

>>49967154
Is designing the biological structure the attraction? If not (or even if you just need inspiration), I'd recommend looking at real world invertebrates. There are so many variations on the "digestive tube with supporting systems" structure that it's actually almost impossible for an author to dream up something that doesn't actually exist somewhere.

>>49953569
Shoot

>>49967776
Magic isn't handwaving you dongle. "A wizard did it" isn't bad because a wizard did it, it's because it's said by GMs as a quick and easy explanation -- i.e., a handwave. In other words, it's only a generic representation of handwaves, not a handwave itself.

Magic can easily explain something properly. It's probably the only way of satisfactorily explaining flying islands, beyond sci-fi. Rationalising the irrational feels contrived (probably with exceptions).

>>49969421
>Magic can easily explain something properly. It's probably the only way of satisfactorily explaining flying islands, beyond sci-fi.
Very true. My setting's floating islands are a result of wild magics performed by one of the dragon lords, specifically to give his sky wyrm-kin a safe place to roost.

>>49967577
i've fooled around with the idea before too. i imagined them floating through trapped gas as well. i came up with some explanations for the gas staying where it is.
1. the floating rocks are fairly new, some recent seismic event might have send them flying
2. the gasses do escape but very slowly, consequently the islands are slowly lowering.
3. some kind of micro organism creates and replenishes the gas

as for the stability, you could justify them not spinning in a few ways as well
1. they did spin, but the civilization that colonized it stabilized them through counterweights, chains, or other man made structures.
2. metalic ore is distributed in layers through the rock, which causes them to align with a magnetic field. its a bit handwavy, but better then making the rocks float with magnetic fields.

Historically, how long have city-states survived relative to kingdoms?

>>49969985
The same. In many ways they're indistinguishable, it's just one places more emphasis on the city as a whole (rather than the ruler, and the nation).

>>49962458
Airships in my campaign function by using special glass crystals.
The glass is inherently strange in composition, although I didn't go into detail about how or why.
Sand is harvested from the various sources, refined into "Lev-Glass" crystals, these react to heat and pressure, the more heat and pressure you apply, the greater the upward force the crystals generate.

In order to harvest this the crystals are placed into pressure chambers, which are pumped full of steam.
This whole system functions much like a steam locomotive as far as airships are concerned. With release valves to vent pressure in case of emergencies, or to descend.
Pump enough steam into the chambers and the crystals eventually create enough upward force to pull other things up with them, like entire ships. Balance becomes an issue, so many ships have 4 or more pressure chambers distributed across the perimeter of the deck.
The addition of direction propellers enables forward movement and steering, no sails/rudders required.

Anyways, maybe the islands aren't floating naturally. Maybe whatever civ is living on them build giant lev-stone engines and strapped that shit on?

>>49970227
On another note, destroying the pressure chambers has become such a tactical "go to" option, that they have to armored, and are usually sunk into the deck with battlements around them.

If one of the chambers is pierced, the explosive decompression is usually enough to take a good chunk of ship with it.

The system isn't perfect, but it was interesting enough for my players to invest heavily on an airship of their own and spend tons of money tricking it out and making it as safe as possible.

>>49970083
Shouldn't it be more difficult for a city-state to militarily not be destroyed? Sure being larger also means having to defend more, and stretch thinner but it also means more resources

>>49970486
Being rich could probably get you some high quality mercs. And allies. And supplies.

In the end it probably all depends on case-to-case ability to rally people, finance armies and the military doctrine.

>>49969985
Still around today.
Now if you're asking how relevant or powerful they are, that's a different story.

Best modern example I can name is Singapore. Incredibly economical prosperous and relatively influential in Southeast Asia.

>>49965093
Assuming you aren't the guy who went off about sex, if I were to consider starting a thread specifically for my setting, if only to speed along development, what would you say to it?

>>49970486
Nope. City state != a city. Hinterland and hegemony, anon. Sparta and Athens were city states, remember? So were Venice (which fended off two empires) and Genoa (which provided mercenaries bloody everywhere).

Also, they're usually fucking rich trade states. They'd have enough to defend themselves, AND people wouldn't want to fight them because they'd rely on them for trade&money (of course, at some point they end up thinking "I'd prefer owning all this shit myself", but it's discouraged).

>>49970638
>Also, they're usually fucking rich trade states. They'd have enough to defend themselves, AND people wouldn't want to fight them because they'd rely on them for trade&money
That's how my South Shore city-states are still around. Most of them have a long-lived Elf population, and have a monopoly on some valuable good. Helps that there's an official, trans-national mercenary organization.

Talking of large medieval port city-states, what demographic breakdown would you expect?

>>49971039
Where is it located?
And what setting? Our world or fantasy?

>>49971075
It's fantasy, but fairly low fantasy.

By where it being located, what do you mean?

How can a mermaid serve as a concubine?

>>49971130
You want an obvious answer or some kind of sick joke?

>>49971160
I mean she doesn't exactly have all the bits.

>>49971191
Love will find a way, especially if it's a disgusting love for a half-fish. Oral sex is the obvious answer. Sick joke is still work in progress.

Now this union would probably be infertile (Unless it's a world where man can impregnant a fish), but such is fate for all who wants to mate outside their species.

>>49971130
>>49971191
Classical mermaids did have the bits actually, look it up.

So to answer your question... Normally, except you gotta put her back in her tank afterwards.

>>49971241
This world is perpetually underwater. I'm basically mixing Princess of Mars with The Little Mermaid. You need the mermaid concubine if you're going for this.

>>49971281
Will there be a dashing human protagonist in old-timey diving suit?

>>49971303
That is an option, yes.

>>49967577
I mean if you haven't guessed by the shape of my pictured islands, my setting doesn't particularly ascribe to real world physical laws. Hell the only reason I'm keeping those planetside is for the sake of simplicity and familiarity, also because I'm not an actual god, I have no intention of working out the finicky laws for a world that couldn't possibly exist.

>But at that point, what's keeping them fixed?
They are, as is the will they impose upon the aether.
>Why aren't they all moving and crashing into eachother?
Many smaller islands have wide or erratic orbits, while the larger ones tend to keep considerably more still. These orbits are about the solar central. I've also written an entire post which you've linked to that clearly demonstrates that they very well can and do bump around if close enough to other islands. Where else did you think earthquakes came from?
>Why don't they flip over?
They're will upon the aether, which again can be overcome by some other force with the example of not pluto down in the bottom and its freaky sister moon.
>Why don't the sinking elements and floating elements separate over time, like oil and water?
Because I don't actually explain things that way, but was merely putting it out there as an idea, but if you rocked the floating idea perhaps floating islands are a fairly short lived event. They wiggle themselves free, break from the earth, and its your job to speculate as to were and get up there before they "deflate".
>What is holding these things together in the long term (geological timespans)?
Still that whole will thing. Which I'd hardly call "handwavey anime level of realism". After a certain point in any setting the answer to a question will become "because". This is true for the origin of countries, magic, or any differences from our real world. After a certain point the only reason things exist is because you've created them as such.

>>49962458
>>49967577
>>49969939
I'm doing the same thing in my Mediterranean fantasy described here >>49961008
with pretty much no magic - at least not explained magic, just a touch of supernatural shit here and there.

Basically, because it's never happened in real life, yes everyone is right, there's no real way to make floating mountains or islands without sprinkling some handwave, which is okay because it's fantasy. And magic does count as handwaving because spoiler alert magic doesn't actually exist.

I explained it as a mix of the trapped flammable gas and some magnetic field alignment / lots of metals, but realized there was no way to do it that made 100% sense. So I added that the mountain range they're at is a dangerous place feared by everyone because the laws of the universe make less and less sense the further you go there. People explode when they walk under the mountain, disappear if they try to mine them, etc. One even exploded during a failed invasion.

Absolutely silly in an otherwise serious setting and is only barely linked with real life science, but that's the route you have to go with this kind of stuff I guess.

Sci-fi is a different story though. I'm sure someone smarter than me could come up with something better

>>49971093
In relation to the other parts of the world. And fantasy means that now I need to know of the other races in the world to decide who'd live there.

>>49967906
Basically, the idea was that the Fathalhi Raiders would have been raiding for a few generations already, but they were starting to do more daring raids that were more bad for the victims. BAsically, they were starting to bulldoze all of the humans on the coast and on the mainland to a point where total conquering was inevitable.

Seeing how the giants were become more of a threat then they already were, and toppling a few nations already, a bunch of kingdoms and merchant republics got together and to form a defensive pact to not let one more set of giant feet touch the shores.

Then the notPope called for a holy war against them(may have been convinced to do so by one or more of the members of the defensive pact, may have been on his own volition)

So, the nations and republics elect a council of kings and leaders to lead the invasion.

But then one or more of the members of the council dies only a couple months in, and everything goes to shit.
1/2

>>49973586

Armies start disregarding orders and just plain ol looting and massacring women and children(they have a hard time, because, well, they're giants. but nonetheless some real nasty shit happens) as a sort of vengeance for all the misery that happened to them. And all the kingdoms and republics start to vie for control over Fathalahm, sabotaging the holy war so that they can make it out on top and leave the other nations in the dirt. Basically, as soon as the council fell apart, they turned on each other like hungry dogs.

The giants took advantage of this disunity and some secret support from some of the kingdoms("listen, we're short and you dont like us, we know. But if you kill those other short people, we'll make sure your tribe ends out on top")

So in the end, notEuropean humans invaded Britian/Nordic country island, most of the leaders that held this ramshackle and poorly-thought out expedition died, everyone started to backstab each other, and the giants took advantage of some cooperation with the small folk and booted them off the island so they could lick their wounds for the next century.

This is subject to massive change and much more elaboration, but that's the gist.

probably not as exciting as you were hoping, but meh.

Hey all. First time posting in /wbg/. I'm looking for help on city building. how do you go about it, and specifically do you know of any programs that assist with it. Also how do you determine the size of a city in correlation to drawing on a piece of graph paper. I'm also looking for a guide to creating deities and detailing a cosmology of the outer planes.

So as an exercise over the next week I am not going to build a setting, not even a country. I am going to construct a single city with a population of 3.2 million individuals.

What would people suggest as the best programs for drawing city maps?

>>49973993
Hmm.. No clue.

Poisonally, I'd go for a detailed city builder. Cities Skylines if it's modern or future tech. Dunno wot to use otherwise.

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Drew a cute Pumpkin Patch since I was feeling festive, but Pumpkins do have some practical uses within the setting:

-Pumpkins can be carved and hollowed out into jack-o-lanterns which can then be used to distract ghosts.

-Pumpkins are one of the few normal foods that Undead can still eat. Vampires, specifically, grow and purchase pumpkins to make into cookies, bread, biscuits, juices, soups, pies, etc.. to add some desperate flavor variety to their diet.

-Thankfully, Pumpkins grow like weeds in haunted areas; large patches being common in clearings like blackberry bushes.

>>49951094
Aight I want dwarfs that worship Giants because Giants once they reach a significant age turn into mountains on their death

Wat do

>>49974758
>Nightmare Before Christmas the Game

Doin' it right Anon

>>49975005

Do exactly that anon.

Also, make it so that mountains retain some of the giant's features.
That way Dwarfs have a giant face to worship.

So, is this too stupid even for a semi-comedic setting:

A nation full of overly bureaucratic necromancer who cast spells by throwing a bundle of forms and contracts into the air and then actually casting the spells (because for a necromancer to cast anything legally is to slave away at the desk, filling forms and signing contracts ad nauseum). As such the entire nation, which is upheld by the necromancers' magic, is covered in a thin layer of paper with faded writing over on them, which then creates slightly annoying paper storms when the winds pickup.

It's a semi-comedic setting

>>49973921
Inkwell Random city map generator is awesome, it's got just enough customization that it's all very different, while it's not a crazy amount that wouldn't overwhelm a new user.

>>49975599
I actually really like that Anon...

Reminds me of the Lawyer enemies from the hell levels of Earthworm Jim

>>49975629
Thanx . Second question. How would I go about having a culture build a city on and around and active volcano. Magic is involved in keeping the flows from killing people but im wondering if it could be engineered without magic.

>>49976263
Pompeii.

>>49976263
Easy, if it's a non-explosive eruption (a lava flow) intricate channels could be dug to prevent it from getting anywhere near people.

Or your could try to dam it up, but that would probably result in a massive disaster later (would make for a fun encounter though)

>>49967154

I kind of wish I could go into more physiological detail with my creatures, but I fucking hate biology. Most cases just think "is this completely impossible", if not just chuck it in there.

>>499762
Pompeii was built at the base the mountain. What I mean to say is that these people actually live on and around the peak of the volcano.

>>49975222
I realize now how easy it is to do

Only now I can't think how Giants interact with the world at large now.

Should they be solitary creatures that spend all day lounging from the gifts of dwarves?

Should they be marauders who use their dwarven worshippers to seek out excellent cities to raid for food and tribute?

Should they be holy symbols that cause dwarfs to declare war on anybody who slays or kill one?

Should I do all of the above? What else can I do with this?

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So I'm writing a holy scripture for my world. I wanted an interesting creation myth mixing a lot of Abrahamic, ancient norse, and ancient greek ideas, with some more fantasy-like ideas. I also wanted something akin to the Bible in style and layout, recently having read it. Finally I wanted some interesting themes and more subtle undertones, with interesting multiple interpretations.

I ended up writing the first chapter of it, using the verse numbering style of the Bible, and also taking from study bibles I added a notes section.

I'd love to get some feedback on the writing, the themes, the creation myth itself, and the "scripture feel" of it, as well as anything else you can think of.

>>49976731
All of the above sounds nice.

I'd go with something of a Paul Bunyan approach: humanize them, but make 'em still larger than life.

Whats the best way to invade a planet? A lot of science fiction uses small VOTL spacecraft to establish a beachhead and big VOTLs to bring down soldiers and supplies, but I'm not convinced big spaceships like that could ever take off again if they tried to land. Instead, I've been toying with the idea of using space planes. The initial invasion force could come down in drop pods or one shot, disposable transports, then once a beachhead was established they would build or capture a landing strip so space planes could reinforce them from orbit. Otherwise, supplies could only come from either more one way drop ships or scattered supply drop. It'd make the initial invasion forces a lot like paratroopers during WWII: completely surrounded and without a means of retreat, they'd hold the line until the rest of the army shows up. What would be the consequences of this kind of warfare? I'd imagine invasion's would be considered a lot riskier, since you can't pick up and leave if everything goes wrong.

>>49977485
>Whats the best way to invade a planet?
The Necromonger invasion at the start of the second Riddick movie comes to mind.

Dropping capital ships straight into major population centers and deploying the invasion force from there is pretty much an unbeatable strategy. You deliver your whole force right away, while the enemy is limited in its ability to fight back with heavy weapons because you're right there among their civilians.

Planetary invasions are a pretty big deal; I wouldn't be worried about large invasion ships being unable to take off again. If you conquer a whole world, it will be well worth the cost of replacing them.

>>49977200
As far as the writing goes, I'd try to embellish the language a little bit more. Use old words and strange phrases that sound a little odd to the modern ear to get across the idea the the text is old (unless its supposed to be a modern translation like Modern English Bible).

The myth's cool. I like the idea of showing the creation of god, instead of just assuming god was always there.

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>>49977485
Well I do no the best way for less advanced planets

>Land
>Announce self to world
>Demonstrate your technological superiority (preferably in a nonlethal manner if you're not a dick)
>Explain what you want and what you'll do to them if you don't get it

Klaatu knew his shit

>>49977485
>Whats the best way to invade a planet?

That depends on if you need it NOW or if you need it LATER.

Because I'm pretty sure if time isn't an issue you can just SIEGE a planet: park your cruisers, battleships, and whatever you've got in your fleet and just orbit the world keeping everything in and everything.
You could also use this to your advantage and casually take out any of their satellites to cripple their communication ability while you casually bombard the planet from the safety of orbit- dropping literally any kind of garbage from space will cause catastrophic damage when it hits the ground.

THOUGH.
Your strategy may have to change dramatically depending on WHY you want the planet.
Do you want the sapient peoples? The unique and irreplaceable biosphere? Their media/cultural treasures?

Invading a planet can become incredibly complicated if you need them for their animated films or if they're the only planet where cattle are an indigenous species.

>>49977671
This is also true for Superhero/Villain reveals or whenever you ascend to godhood.

I'm completely out on inspiration at the moment. I need a new hook. Hit me guys. Anything.

>>49979431
>Hit me with anything
A brick

>>49979431
Alright..

Bogeymen are actually memetic parasites that live off the fear of its host and to some extent, control their actions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxmhdwn4Mr4

>>49970227
>>49970275
I think that approach is the best way to floating islands personally. Not specifically heat/pressure, but just giving them a fleshed out source and enough rules and constraints that you can do interesting stuff with them, they feel connected to the world, and there are consequences if they fail.

I've never used the heat/prssure approach but I've done floating islands in a couple of words and one used a similar idea where it was how much electric current you could pump into them, and another based on blood sacrifice, so you island required more people sacrificed per day the bigger it was.

>>49970486
City-states were sometimes military vulnerable, yeah, but these anons have the right of it >>49970516 >>49970638.

The other thing is sometimes you'd get things like the Hanseatic League, which were more about trade convenience than military defense usually, but it would still allow cities to band together to hire guards and secure trade passages and that kind of thing. You could probably extrapolate that a bit in a world where they would have some sort of combined military force to aid in defense.

>>49971226
Are humans and elves the same species? If not, how do you explain the countless numbers of half-elves?

A mermaid might be able to procreate with a human male, if the man sprayed his ejaculate on the eggs the half-fish had laid.

Hey /wbg/

I want star signs to be a big part of my world but where do I start with making them seem real?

>>49981653
Give them characters, and have those characters permeate/affect the world.

Lads does this sound good
Mythological nation building adventure type world(think Gilgamesh or Norse sagas) where all the magic comes from the gods, who themselves are partially powered by their believers(kinda Terry Pratchett Small Gods style).

>>49982536
sure

I'm thinking of breaking a single kingdom into a three-city state league, there's 3 mostly distinct cultures from a setting stand point there's really no downside right one less nation for some variety.

>>49982536
(Mythopoeia)

>>49982536
>lads
No.
>nation building
No.

>>49982998
But cultural tension within a country can be Fun.

>>49983395
That is true too

GUSY WHAT IT HAVE SOME COOLS TUFF IN MY WORLD

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A special gauntlet is indestructible and provides complete protection to the hand that it covers. The fingers can still move and grip enemy weapons.

Is it better than a shield?

>>49984535
Not really. Most shields and normal gauntlets may as well be indestructible. There's some advantages to using a bare gauntlet over a buckler, in some contexts, but that apples to any gauntlet.

>>49982998
>>49983395

What if you combine the two? Make it a confederation or a federation with a weak central government. That way there's unity between the city states, but they can still act individual and have cultural conflicts.

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Would it be possible to have a series of mountain ranges some hundred kilometers apart from each other in a north-south axis with a large river splitting every single one of the mountain ranges half? Or would that be completely unnatural?

Inkarnate map for reference, not the actual product.

>>49985060
That seems ridiculously unnatural.

>>49984535
No.
A shield doesn't just defend your hand, after all. It defends the rest of your body too, and is bigger.

Now you'd argue bucklers, but those are also designed in a way that it properly deflects blows. That gauntlet doesn't do it as well as a buckler would.

>>49984535
Does fuck-all to absorb blunt damage, unless it's made of vibranium. Still doesn't protect you well from breath attacks.

>>49985060
I can't imagine how that would occur naturally, even if we assume the rare chance of having tectonic plates lined up correctly.

Supposing we label the plates A, B, C, etc. from north to south.

If A and B are moving towards each other, and C and D are moving towards each other (which would form the best mountain ranges), then B and C would form a rift, not mountains.

If all the faults were moving in the same direction, but B was moving faster than A, C was moving faster than B, etc., then, first of all, the mountain ranges wouldn't be very high, and also I have no idea what arrangement of the mantle would allow that to happen.

If the plates are moving parallel to one another, you'd be sort of on the right track, though that again would call for some very bizarre tectonic movements. Although--fun fact--when a river runs over such a faultline, it can get twisted into weird shapes. It can run straight-ish in one direction, dramatically shift 30m to a side (where the moving plates have shifted it), then continue in the same direction as before. I think there's a river like that in the Carrizo plain.

Also, there's the fact that rivers tend to originate in mountains. Is there another mountain range that produces this river?

Fair warning that geology isn't a specialty of mine, but suffice to say, it's completely unnatural. Unless there are some high-power feng shui wizards in your setting that wouldn't happen.

>>49976731
>>49977415
They should be fey-Like it would make them seem more otherworldly and unnatural deepening why the rock fuckers seek to worship them

How would you handle Reproduction and what not? Or where they even live. Wouldn't Giants live in secluded areas due to Dwarves trying to axe everybody a question when they try to defend themselves from their gods?

>>49953030
Not him, but what if there are city states and burgeoning kingdoms not recognized by the larger realms?

>>49953786
How is a giant going to keep and milk cattle with its giant fingers?

>>49985920
I'd imagine it just picks up the cow and sucks the milk out of the udders. A little like a juice box.

Or selectively breeding favorable cows.

>>49985746
Fey how?

Like giant assholes who promise you lost secrets then either enslave your village to their underground worshippers or eat you?

Or fey like in their appearances and origins? Lost spirits who inhabited mortal forms and twisted them?

As for their reproduction I'm stuck there. I don't know what to do with that

Recently, I started writing a campaign setting for a 5th edition campaign, and I quickly realized that the tone of the setting lent well to the idea of being a "humans only" setting. I still want to give my players options, so I'm thinking of giving them a choice of "culture" rather than race (Similar to the Adventures of Middle Earth book did for 5e).

My question is, how do you make human cultures and ethnic groups that are familiar yet different? How do you come up with a name for each group, when each group will more or less have a real world analogue.

What tools do you use for mapping cities and settlements? What about creating maps for actual dungeons? I use Inkarnate a lot for overworld maps to varying degrees of success, but I have yet to find a digital tool I really like for mapping less organic locales. I can do it fine on paper, but I'd like to create nice images for my roll20 campaign without resorting to roll20's awful mapmaking UI.

>>49986707
I did something similar (while still having a few "elf" races, basically slightly different humans) in my own setting. What I did is picked a handful of real world cultures that have some degree of overlap/connectivity and add dashes of other interesting stuff.

Eg; the native cultures were based off of Baltic/Western Slavic, Balkan/Greek, and Khazar, with dashes of Chinese and Native American thrown in to make it a little different. After that had developed a little bit, I had humans invade/migrate from over the ocean, bringing French/Spanish elements, in some places blending with the local, and in other places displacing it completely.

For names, follow vaguely the language of the culture you're emulating; if possible base things off of regional dialects like Spanish>Catalan. For my French culture, I used a lot of soft "c," words ending in "e" or a double letter then "e." For pseudo Greek, lots of "k" "y" and words ending in "os". It's rough, but kind of makes sense once you get into the habit of it.

>>49951355
>Are there reliable paths to immortality? Will you whittle away down to nothing over a long time, or is your form easily maintained?
There aren't any, outside of myth.

>On what scale is your strongest magic? Could the world's strongest Wizard make a wish and alter the fabric of reality?
Magic isn't all that well defined or understood, but as it stands there's never been a wizard capable of altering anything on the world scale.

>Are there already reasonably powerful deities to keep a newly empowered in check?
Deities aren't "provably" real like they are in Forgotten Realms; some holy men wield supernatural power that they attribute to divine favour, but a secular wizard would dismiss it as arcane rituals dressed up in religious trappings (druids and naturalistic wielders of the occult would in turn call "scientific magic" a feeble attempt at ordering the the majesty and power of something inherently wild).

>Would it be easier just to create a personal demi-plane to rule over?
No such thing exists, as far as anyone is aware.

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>>49987162

Okay, what are your pet peeves about certain fantasy races and/or aliens?

>>49985902
>Not him, but what if there are city states and burgeoning kingdoms not recognized by the larger realms?
Not really that outlandish. States refusing to acknowledge the sovereignty of other states, and wannabe-states attempting to assert their independence, is a regular feature of diplomacy past and present.

I mentioned "grey areas" in my count of countries before, and most of those are current real-life examples of states whose independence is contested. The likes of Kosovo, South Ossetia and Palestine are all examples involved in the sort of conflict you describe in very recent history.

>>49987432
While I appreciate the guide, I'm looking for something more along the lines Inkarnate, but for smaller scale/grid based functions. If I can't find anything, I guess I'll have to resort to Photoshop, god forbid. I've been using it for years and I still hate how unwieldy it is.

>>49987468
Not about any race in particular, but the whole race=culture cop out. Eg., all dwarves everywhere are basically the same, all elves everywhere are the same, and so on and so forth. It's lazy and people shouldn't do it. It's especially prevalent when elves or halfligns or what have you live side by side with humans in the same settlement for hundreds of years, yet are still incredibly culturally distinct? That's not even remotely how things work.

And really, it's fine in high fantasy, less serious settings, I've done it myself in beer and chips one shots and light hearted campaigns. But when someone goes on about their serious/realistic setting and then has something like that, I can't help but scoff.

>>49987468
Long lived races kinda put me off, anything over two or three centuries tends to make them too inhuman to really be able to pull off well.

Race=Culture too is a bit of a gibbon.

>>49984535
Depends on what you're trying to stop. Against arrows? Not so much.

You can get a pretty good idea how this would work by observing traditional combat (as we know it from fighting manuals of the past) for combatants in full plate armor and using swords. In this context, the gauntlets (and most of the rest of the body) are functionally indestructible... killing blows are only possible by stabbing into the weak joints of the armor. As we know from the fight books, grabbing the enemy's weapon, deflecting blows with the arm or shoulder, and even grappling all become legitimate techniques.

>>49985333
An indestructible gauntlet would absolutely help deflect a blow from a mace or similar. While not "sharp", such weapons still do more damage because they concentrate their force at the point of impact. That doesn't mean it wouldn't hurt (even the best weapon-weapon blocks will usually ring you a bit), but it would definitely help.

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So I have this weird Hindu/Wuxia space fantasy game i'm trying to write up and i've come across religion. I want a Monolatristic religion for the known worlds. There are many faces of a god, worshipped as itself, but there is only one true god who isn't normally worshipped. This allows for all manner of strange temple and doctrine, but all still under the same faith. Does this make sense? Does it help if I said the god/gods are dead?

>>49988365

Very common. Look at real life Hinduism and Catholicism.

>>49988910
Can something like it exist across space though?

>>49988954

If you go with an alternative reality, yes. Makes the rules actually self evident or the creator/authority being actually well known in the soul of every creature born to get the feeling of spread out but differing Monotheism.

Fantasy settings don't have to be /tg/'s science but then magic and shit lol but everything else makes scientific sense. You can give a fantasy setting whatever physical laws you want, which could be based entirely on consensus or the whim of one omnipotent creator.

>>49951094
I think Elder Scrolls would be pretty cool if someone sat down and expanded the size and density of cities and treated them like living things with the need for water and crops. Try to make it feel less like a theme park.

>>49989084
Elder Scrolls in written lore/early games is like that I think, the reason that cities feel kind of empty/depthless is the sheer amount of work and physical space you need to make a proper city work. If you were to do the Imperial city to actual scale, it would take up at least half of the in-game world, and require an amount of processing power that is barely available on modern consoles, let alone past-generation consoles.

Though I do strongly agree with your point, I've been wanting to run an urban campaign set in the Imperial City for a long time.

>>49988954
>>49989024
I think it works... pretty safe bet there will still be religion in a far future setting. If people still believe in god with the amount of science we have now, then they will believe in god with any amount of science.

And with more planets / peoples / cultures / species to deal with, those religions that exist will need to be ideologically flexible enough to cope. So, yeah, I think you're onto something.

In a group of late post-apocalyptic (society went boom a long time ago, think Fallout) survivors with a strong military aesthetic, structure and philosophy, how might its members personalize their uniforms?
Their uniformity and rigid discipline is, in their minds, what separates them from the debased outlaws and pathetic civilians, so minimal accessories. Bonus points if you have ideas for personalizing hard gas masks.

>>49989491
>Their uniformity and rigid discipline is, in their minds, what separates them from the debased outlaws and pathetic civilians

I think they'd be against that sort of thing except for strictly regulation medals/patches

>>49989491
Uniforms have different doodads for determining rank & unit. Paint scemes n' shieet.

>>49989553
Yeah, that's what I was thinking too. Dammit, I wanna throw on more stuff.

>>49989491
Most of their gas masks are in pretty bad shape. Privates and other low-ranking people get beat-up gas masks--both of the eyeholes are cracked, the tube thing might have a hole covered with duct tape, etc. A higher-ranking member might have an intact tube and only one cracked eyehole; and of course only the folks at the top have the really pristine gas masks.

>>49989861
Quality of uniforms in general as a rank marker is a pretty great idea, and helps reinforce their themes even more than before. Thanks, you undid a creative knot I didn't even know was there.

Anyone else familiar with engineerguy? I've found his videos very helpful in coming up with fantasy tech--seeing the reasoning behind why things in the real world are the way they are is a great jumping-off point for the way things could be with different physics (e.g. magic) and limitations.

>>49990005
Good to hear. I was pretty proud of myself when I came up with that so I'm glad you like it too.

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So I've put some more time into my creation myth, and made this document from one of the nations in my world.

If you don't wish the read the entire thing (the font being a bit of a pain is on purpose) here's the gist of the creation myth so far.

In the beginning there is a void, and nothing else. It begins acting upon itself and pulls itself together creating a kernel of being. This being then starts pulling on the void and makes itself and has intelligence. This being is called Jor-On ("He is"). He then makes a brother by splitting himself in two, in order to show him all that he has made.

Unable to see his brother he creates a light, but in anger his brother smashes it, creating the stars. He then creates a smaller light and gives it thought, and orders it to kill his brother, and in his death all physical matter is created, spread out throughout the universe in chaos. He also changes name to Jor-Ek ("He remains").

Being sad about being alone and having much of his work undone into chaos, he makes a space separate from the chaos in the void, a court, so that he can more easily order the universe.

After ordering the universe he creates four elemental lords to keep him company in his court and to make sure the different types of matter don't mix, as to keep order and keep it "pure", and puts his light in charge of them. This backfires as the lords in their desire to keep pure start fighting among themselves.

Jor-Ek sees this and strips the lords of their thought and basically creates the earth by binding them together, as punishment. He is also displeased by the light that he created and forces it to rise and fall every day, creating the sun.

Now being full of sadness and despair at having to have killed his own children (the lords and light) he screams into the void, and from this another being, called Vatas is born. This is an otherworldly monstrosity (Think lovecraftian) and is a being of pure despair.

Will continue in the next post.

>>49991067
Cont.

This despair turns into fear and then into hate, and he flees creating his own court. Since he is basically a manifestation of Jor-Ek's fear and hate he wants to destroy what Jor-Ek has created, to "complete" the destruction he experienced in the death of the elemental lords.

The steals the essences of these lords from Jor-Ek and recreates the elemental lords and promise them eternal war between each other (Since they desire it in their misguided attempts to please Jor-Ek) and they swear loyalty to him.

Vatas, in complete opposite to Jor-Ek, gives the lords free reign to create their own beings, and they do, and so does Vatas, and they start sending these being to the world. Once there their minions take from the matter of the lord they are associated with (For example earth, water, etc.) and take physical form, in the shape of incredibly, nation-sized giants bent on destroying the world.

Jor-Ek sees this and locks away Vatas and his lords so they no longer can send their beings to take physical form on the world.

[This will also allow me to do a sort of elemental magic later where it is used by breaching this lock and siphoning out very small amounts of essence of the millions of beings created by the lords, and it explains how they can have physical form on the earth, but not in their own dimension. It also makes it so that to create say, a stone golem, you actually need the right amount of physical material first, and then imbue it with the essence.]

Jor-Ek then creates twelve guardians to watch over the world to stop any of these beings getting through despite the lock, and he shapes the world into its current form as he has gained a new appreciation of its beauty as a result of Vatas' actions, since Vatas is basically an aspect of himself.

Also, in the first post, the first part with him and his brother is basically just him having a schizophrenic episode and fighting with himself.

There are a lot of other themes as well.

>>49991067
You need to work on your summarizing skills, buddy.

>>49991559
It is summarized though, for example when I wrote this part:
>Being sad about being alone and having much of his work undone into chaos, he makes a space separate from the chaos in the void, a court, so that he can more easily order the universe.

The original text I refer to actually reads:
He now looked around him and said, "Woe is me for all around me is chaos. I had gathered myself but now I am once again splintered." And he said, "But I shall order all around and make it regular, so that my efforts were not in vain." And thus he took the void and he made it regular; a sphere equal of breadth and of height. He then said to himself, "Woe is me for I have none around me to share with, but I will not make the mistakes of the past I shall make a place in the void separate from the chaos, so I can better order it." And he did so. Looking upon the universe he began to order it, putting earth with earth, air with air, water with water, and metal with metal; and thus it was done.

I need a really brief like "off the top of your head impression" of this:

Several hundred years after an occult fueled apocalypse North America has finally become livable once more. Settlers from mainland china live in city states along the west coast, now having declared independence from imperial rule, and struggle in constant conflict with the barbaric tribes to the south and their rattling smoke belching motored vehicles. Dotting the landscape is pieces more valuable than gold. Rubber, chemicals, perhaps even preserved documents on how to make them lie buried beneath the landscape. The California coast has become hostile, and in recent time the city states unstable after breaking away from control of the Imperial Dynasty. With beasts twisted by strange energies, black oil barbarians, and greedy abhumans abounding how can one make their fortune in this new land?

In summary, chinafornia.

http://pastebin.com/QTqWE9H8

pastebin contains a lot of setting info

>>49992082
My first instinct was "this sorta reminds me of Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind", which isn't a bad thing. Just 'cause of the first part.

Why China, exactly?

>>49954225
The God's built a prison in voidspace to keep people from going there. People went there.

>>49992123
In the setting the asian continent was the only one that was left intact that had any sort of interest in the rest of the world. China happened to come out on top because the scenario essentially had a WWII occult apocalypse where the Germans betrayed the Japanese and leveled most of the Japanese archipelago. China was left because the Germans didn't care, turned the entirety of Europe into a wasteland for hundreds of miles around Germany's borders and built ???, for those who know it they refer to it as the Shining City or the City Ablaze. Africa has a huge set of issues of its own and has the only surviving Europeans not allied to the Germans (who are hiding out), but the occult Apocalypse brought magic back to the world and Africa was one of the places it came back most unfriendly to humans (spitting out non-human intelligent entities that enslaved a good portion of the population). So africa is in constant war.

South America is behind the Curse Wall for the most part save for a few bits of Peru, which are populated by cannibals.

The southern asian and pacifica nations are mostly under Chinese rule.

Australia is a hell hole no one wants to visit where you need and aboriginal shaman or a sealed tank to move across the desert safely.

>>49954225
Right here>>49992082

>>49992271
So how has Australia changed in your setting?

>>49992536
It wasn't.

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What are you're thoughts on a mechanic for making items become magical when they are used to slay a magical/powerful creature and/or bathed in the blood of such a creature?

>>49994734
Depends entirely on the setting, and how magic is explained in the setting. It also depends on how it is done. Items becoming magical through slaying a powerful creature through a boon of the gods, I'm all for. In the way I think you mean, I'm generally negative towards.

>>49994734
I need to think about including something similar. My setting already has blood being an alternative fuel for magic, so blood being an alternative to gold for binding enchantments might work.

>>49994960
See, I don't like the idea of gods giving boons like that. What is it you don't like about magic 'soaking' in to other items?

>>49995500
It triggers my autism. I like having well-explained magic, and I feel like any sufficiently explained magical system that allows for that is too easy to exploit, and will leave too many "plot holes".

>>49985920
Larger cows.

>>49994734
>Load a cannon full of adamantine swords
>Fire at monster
>Monster dies
>Have dozens of magic swords

Make sure this doesn't work.

>>49973074
It's located on hourglass shaped continent. Think of the Americas if they were squashed vertically, with everything From Mexico and to the south being a monster-filled Wasteland. The city is somewhere where New Orlean is, it's Eastmost extremity of the feudal territories and it's a place where land-bound merchant would load onto the ships and sail further East to a mysterious nation of spice and magic.

There's no other races but humans.

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Differentiating characters of same species is bit tricky. Has anyone else made sort of sheets for 'visual features' for non-human species?

>>49951355
Immortality is extraordinarily difficult to attain, you can count all immortals of the world with two hands.

As for godhood, it's also difficult, since it requires a spark of creation from either chaos or pattern, which is nigh-impossible task.
So far only three have done it so far. One attained understanding of world and managed to foster a pseudo-spark of his own. One managed to attain a sliver of previously mentioned's spark and became a demigod. One ate a god and attained its spark.

As for magic, the vast majority is weak, with usable spells being on par with or slightly stronger than technological solutions ( with major interest in those cases that don't have technological solution ). However, thaumaturges can get stupidly powerful - strongest living would probably be level 13 in 3.5. Of course, there could have been more powerful ones.

>>49957668
Big. Friendly. Bees.
Ants and beetles are rather cute, too.

>>49957976
I wouldn't worry about number before seeing how it affects the setting. If it gets too clusterfucky/schizophrenic, streamlining might be in order.
At least, you don't want overlapping with the sort of niches.

>>49962458
God wills it.

>>49996037
Yeah, no mass-producing them.
Although I'd say cannon would become magical.

>>49985060
No chances happening naturally. But if it is creationist setting, it could be a thing.

>>49996670
>I'd say cannon would become magical.
Granted, that's pretty smart.

>>49996037
Probably the sword that striken the final blow would be magical. Or all of them would be slightly magical.

That'd make an interesting dilemma. Anyone can gang-slay a beast and get a bit magical sword, but to make a really good sword you'll have to do it alone.

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>>49994734
>Gaining powers from the blood of other creatures

Say no more

>>49996318
>Think of the Americas with everything From Mexico and to the south being a monster-filled Wasteland
Laying down some social commentary, there, Anon?

>>49995738
>Giants would have giant cows
There's actual plentiful mythic precedent for giants having giant livestock... from pre-christian ireland right up to Babe the Blue Ox.

>>49997230
The Orcs are Niggers.

>>49995588
>in favor of well-explained magic
See, I always felt like you had to go to one extreme or the other. A narrative can work with magic that is mysterious and inexplicable, as long as it is CONSISTENTLY mysterious and inexplicable. On the other hand, if you start to get into laying down rules and defining the bounds of a system, then you really have to go all the way down that rabbithole.

This tends to be a sticky morass for game worlds in particular, because actually going full Brandon Sanderson and explaining absolutely everything is a lot of work, but on the other hand the magic system CAN'T be mysterious and inexplicable, because y'know, it's a game... it isn't 'Nam, there are rules.

>>49997230
Not really, it's just how it looks like. Otherwise wasteland part is more like oversized Italy. Was once anyway.

>>49991171
>>49991559
If you've never played the RPG Microscope, I can't recommend it enough. It will make you much better at laying down these sorts of narratives.

As an exercise, try to get your world from Dawn of Time to the Present in three or four bullet points. And then fill out detail underneath those, like you're writing an outline for a school paper. It will help you tremendously with organization/research as you continue to flesh this stuff out.

>>49995500
Not him, but for me it's the fact that it's pseudo-realistic. It obeys real-world processes, and feels hollow. You're treating magic as if it were a scientific element which follows scientific logic, and it ruins any charm magic might have -- literally.

Magic should BE the rules, it shouldn't have rules plonked on top of it. The whole process should reek of charm. Magic is more than "shit wot doesn't happen IRL", it's "shit that you'd expect to happen IRL if you didn't know any better".

Even magitech is fine, but giving it rules like "magic is just one supernatural energy, and now I will impose a bunch of scientific rules on it (ex. that it can pass from object to object)" is soulless. Saying something like "you can gain the qualities of those you eat, and swords eat when you plunge them into flesh and blood" isn't, because it relies on an intuitive process rather than a pseudo-realistic one.
>>49997275
That's what happens when you act all scientific about it. You don't even need to define bounds and rules -- the magic brings its own bounds and rules. Wise men control the winds and the seas because they are wise; genies have to obey the wishes of their masters (but they ONLY have to obey the wishes of their masters); giving gifts to powerful beings gets them to do stuff to you, but only because you gave them gifts.

>>49991651
Then it's shittily summarised.

>>49997362
>>49997275
I think defining characteristic of magic, as opposed to science is operating on high level of reality. Science breaks universe down to particles and fields, looking for common denominators and explaining and exploiting things through them.

Magic operates on words and symbols and such. In terms of science properties of something would be defined by its molecules, molecules by atoms, atoms by protons, electrons and such, protons through quarks and possibly ad infinitum.

Magic would just say it's like this because it's like this. Fantastic sceince would be more towards extrapolations and strict boundaries and magic is as arbitrary as it can be.

>>49997306
Not that guy, but I need to try this.

*The sun god leaves his cupped hands under the water of life to create land and sea.

*Mortals are enslaved and tormented by Him until the fey emerge with wild magic to aid them.

*The True Gods drive both fey and the sun god into hiding and become the main deities of the world.

*Mortals form their own realms, old terrors are forgotten and secular power begins to eat away at the priesthoods' authority.

Are these too long?

>>49997406
I think the main thing is that science breaks it down into discrete impersonal units which then obey laws. Magic doesn't break down into discrete units, and it's never impersonal.

The words and symbols are intuitive, they're personal, and they only make sense in relation to each other. They only make sense as a process. The molecules are impersonal and separate from each other; they exist independent from any process. So too with "energy", which you must then impose processes on ("it soaks through stuff").

You can see this even in the very early sciences. People used to think that Man lived because he had God's breath in him. All of these elements -- God and His breath -- must be united in one continual action, AND all of it runs on personal metaphor.

But then philosophers began to reduce it into simple "vital force" or "qi" (depending which side of Eurasia you come from), and matter and energy, and these things could be (should be) isolated from each other and examined impersonally (objectively).

It's science that is arbitrary, working without any cause. Magic always obeys an understood cause, even if that cause is unreasonable.
>>49997457
None of it is really important. Only the "real-world" effects matter -- how they affect the players' world; I'd focus on them.

>>49997702
>None of it is really important. Only the "real-world" effects matter -- how they affect the players' world; I'd focus on them.

Well, these are the common denominators of global culture and religion, which are key elements of the players' world. The fey and the sun god are real threats which will they will have to confront during many sessions.

Otherwise, why even talk about the dawn of time at all? The prompt was:
>try to get your world from Dawn of Time to the Present
Nothing that happened back then will have any direct effect on the players. In fact, I don't even think there's anything that's happened at all on a global scale that will affect the players directly during the early stages of the campaign.

>>49997799
The point is you focus on them from the players' point of view, then invent whatever history you must to support it.

>why even talk about the dawn of time at all?
Exactly.

>>49997306
-Universe willed itself into existence dispersing its consciousness across the cosmos, magic is born
-Open face sandwiches discovered


Fuck I'm out of ideas

>>49997904
But the prompt I was responding to was literally "from Dawn of Time to Present".

>>49998570
Yes. And?

My GM gave me a glove that is an immovable object to everyone except for its wielder, what are some cool things I can do with it?

>>49998787
Stand on it and lift yourself to fly around?

What the fuck kind of GM would give you an item like that?

>>49998787
Tie people and objects to it
Make crude levitation device out of them by releasing it mid-aid with another person's hand in
Slap people right through (It's immovable, so their jawbones can't stop it)

>>49998815
You're the wielder, dimwit. You can move it.
>>49998816
Gravity isn't a person.

Their jaws can't stop -the glove-, but they can stop the hand that's moving it. Which has the same effect.

>>49998968
Move* not stop.

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>>49998787
Next combat try this

>Grapple foe
>Grab neck with gloved hand
>Pull hand out of glove

It should keep him suspended midair by the neck

>>49999163
They'd just fall to the ground mang.

>>49999621
Oh yeah gravity isn't a person.

Awright, just grip his throat and pull out hand. He shouldn't be able to pull it off him

>>49999667
>Oh yeah gravity isn't a person.
It isn't a person in your setting maybe.

>>49999163
This dude looks like the MC from Cromartie.

>>49999804
The what now?

Also, I'd see if it can't be further enchanted. Maybe an Immovable Rod enchant so it can defy gravity and animation so it can do cool shit like fire crossbows on its own.

>>50001421
>>50001421
>>50001421
new