Worldbuilding Talk Thread

[Yora]

Why is naming things so hard? Need the name of 5 duchies, 4 pirate havens and a handful of miscellaneous nation states, but fantasy names are a pain in the bum.

Ugh, tempted to shamelessly steal the names of other more or less obscure historical location...

The first thing you need to understand about naming things is that you will never make any good names. All the names you come up with will suck.

So instead of trying to create good names, aim to make names that are just barely tolerable and don't seem completely stupid. Once you really started to get used to that, naming things gets a lot easier. They also get better in time. A barely tolerable name becomes quite okay after a couple of days of using it.

[TheWombatOfDoom]

The first thing you need to understand about naming things is that you will never make any good names. All the names you come up with will suck.

So instead of trying to create good names, aim to make names that are just barely tolerable and don't seem completely stupid. Once you really started to get used to that, naming things gets a lot easier. They also get better in time. A barely tolerable name becomes quite okay after a couple of days of using it.

For example, I once named a major trade city "Inasack".

Didn't realize the obvious until players pointed it out. I ended up rolling with it though, and the city motto became, "where you can buy anything you can fit...in a sack."

Still, it was embarassing.

Now that I'm using the world to write an actual novel, I'm having trouble renaming it, because i've gotten fond of the stupid name.

Can't be worse than Bagend, right?

[zabbarot]

If it makes anyone feel better, here is a list of bad city names as voted by some radio station in the US. I'm sure your names are mostly better than these, and these are real.

Spoiler: 50 Cities

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Burnt Corn / Texas / Equality, Alabama
Chicken, Alaska
Why, Arizona
Toad Suck, Arkansas
Skidoo & Weed, California
Last Chance, Colorado
Mianus, Connecticut
Slaughter Beach, Delaware
Lorida, Florida
Santa Claus, Georgia
Volcano, Hawaii
Bliss, Idaho
Kickapoo, Illinois
Gnaw Bone, Indiana
Sac City / Tingley, Iowa
Hope, Kansas
Penile, Kentucky
Dry Prong, Louisiana
Mexico, Maine
Accident, Maryland
Sandwich / Mashpee, Massachusetts
Hell, Michigan
Fertile, Minnesota
Chunky, Mississippi (Money, Coffee)
Cuba, Missouri
Square Butte & Crackerville, Montana
Magnet & Beaver Crossing, Nebraska
Jackpot, Nevada
Sandwich, New Hampshire
Cheesequake, New Jersey
Elephant Butte, New Mexico
Hicksville, New York
Lizard Lick / Whynot, North Carolina
Antler, North Dakota
Fly, Ohio
Hooker, Oklahoma
Boring, Oregon
Intercourse, Pennsylvania
Woonsocket, Rhode Island
Due West / Sugar Tit, South Carolina
Epiphany, South Dakota
Bucksnort, Tennessee
Converse, Texas
Mexican Hat, Utah
Dummerston, Vermont
Bumpass, Virginia
Humptulips, Washington
Hurricane, West Virginia
Imalone, Wisconsin
Baggs, Wyoming

I mean seriously, Lorida, Florida?

[TheWombatOfDoom]

If it makes anyone feel better, here is a list of bad city names as voted by some radio station in the US. I'm sure your names are mostly better than these, and these are real.

Spoiler: 50 Cities

Show

Burnt Corn / Texas / Equality, Alabama
Chicken, Alaska
Why, Arizona
Toad Suck, Arkansas
Skidoo & Weed, California
Last Chance, Colorado
Mianus, Connecticut
Slaughter Beach, Delaware
Lorida, Florida
Santa Claus, Georgia
Volcano, Hawaii
Bliss, Idaho
Kickapoo, Illinois
Gnaw Bone, Indiana
Sac City / Tingley, Iowa
Hope, Kansas
Penile, Kentucky
Dry Prong, Louisiana
Mexico, Maine
Accident, Maryland
Sandwich / Mashpee, Massachusetts
Hell, Michigan
Fertile, Minnesota
Chunky, Mississippi (Money, Coffee)
Cuba, Missouri
Square Butte & Crackerville, Montana
Magnet & Beaver Crossing, Nebraska
Jackpot, Nevada
Sandwich, New Hampshire
Cheesequake, New Jersey
Elephant Butte, New Mexico
Hicksville, New York
Lizard Lick / Whynot, North Carolina
Antler, North Dakota
Fly, Ohio
Hooker, Oklahoma
Boring, Oregon
Intercourse, Pennsylvania
Woonsocket, Rhode Island
Due West / Sugar Tit, South Carolina
Epiphany, South Dakota
Bucksnort, Tennessee
Converse, Texas
Mexican Hat, Utah
Dummerston, Vermont
Bumpass, Virginia
Humptulips, Washington
Hurricane, West Virginia
Imalone, Wisconsin
Baggs, Wyoming

I mean seriously, Lorida, Florida?

Slaughter beach delaware must be off of the Murderkill creek. I went boating down that creek during my bachelor party...

[Milo v3]

SNIP

Admittedly, Volcano sounds like it might be rather descriptive of the area.

[Eldan]

Someone please tell me Why and Whynot are partner cities.

[Corneel]

Why is naming things so hard? Need the name of 5 duchies, 4 pirate havens and a handful of miscellaneous nation states, but fantasy names are a pain in the bum.

Ugh, tempted to shamelessly steal the names of other more or less obscure historical location...

Don't steal directly, steal indirectly.

1. Decide on the type of sound you'd like for your cities (Celtic, Slav, Malinké, Quecha, ...)
2. Check city/town/ etc. names in that language in wikipedia
3. Check etymology/history section to see whether names can be decomposed in constituent elements.
4. Add similar elements
5. Recombine elements and add a bit of assimilation

To give an example, with English you quickly find that a lot of villages, towns and cities end in -ton, -burg, -ford, -wick, etc., while areas will have -shire, -land, -ia. First elements are more variable, but Hart-, Ox(en), Water-, Red-, Green-, East-, West-, Wood-, Marsh- etc. can get you already some ways. So now you can have the town of Hartwick in the duchy of Woshire (<Wood - Shire)
It's not different in other languages.

As an example of 4. In Russian you have the cities of Vladikavkaz (Ruler of the Caucasus) and Vladivostok (Ruler of the East). Both have Vladi- (Ruler of) so that is an interesting common element for a city. And in analogy with Vladivostok, you could use North, South and West to get to the new city names of Vladisever, Vladiyug and Vladizapad.

[Everyl]

Don't steal directly, steal indirectly.

1. Decide on the type of sound you'd like for your cities (Celtic, Slav, Malinké, Quecha, ...)
2. Check city/town/ etc. names in that language in wikipedia
3. Check etymology/history section to see whether names can be decomposed in constituent elements.
4. Add similar elements
5. Recombine elements and add a bit of assimilation

You can be even more indirect by making your own broken-foreign-language names. Most place names in the real world come from very basic descriptions of something about the area. "Oxford" is a place where oxen wade across a river; "Kyoto" is literally "Capital City." We don't notice this much in real-world place names, because they're either derived from languages we don't speak or we've heard the names so much we take them for granted. You can come up with such descriptive names in your native language, then run them through Google Translate or something similar to find out what the name might sound like in another language. Shift sounds around a bit until you get something that's reasonably pronounceable, and you're set.

Example: The city of Five Bridges is named because it is situated at the place where several rivers meet, and each river has at least one permanent stone bridge spanning it, totaling five bridges within the city limits. Google Translate tells me that "Five Bridges" in Hindi is "Panca Pulom" with a few vowel accents whose pronunciation and method of typing on a QWERTY keyboard don't really matter for the purposes of this example. "Pansa" sounds a little more like "Pants" than I want in a name that I might have players saying aloud, so I decide that it's a hard "c," whether or not it is in real Hindi. Use pseudo-Hindi names on most of the other places around Panca Pulom, and you've already taken care of making sure that your fantasy names sound linguistically related to one another when appropriate.

The only caveat is to make sure you use languages that your players don't speak. You're building a fantasy world, whatever pronunciation you decide on is the right one for your world, and it'll be easier for everyone if you don't have to risk players "correcting" you on your own names.

[Yora]

I am currently reading all the way through The Savage Frontier again, which is probably my favorite campaign setting book as far as scope and presentation are concerned. (I also like the place it describes but that's just a matter of personal taste.) It's one of the earliest books for Forgotten Realms, so it's really a very old case of setting sourcebooks. And while I think it does a lot of things right that more recent books have needlesly complicated, I also noticed a few passages that seem really completely pointless.

Stuff like which trade goods are traded between the cities and towns and what special kinds of local coins there are their exchange rates in different places.
I was also flipping to another old setting book today that detailed everything about the region, including specific crafts and giving a small paragraph with its own headline to the trade of basketweaving.

Spoiler

Show

Establishing the style of a setting beyond just the who is who and where is where and spending some thought and explainations on the cultures and the overall flavor of the setting is important and the reason why almost all published "sanbox settings" really don't do anything for me. (Except Red Tide, which is actually much more culture and society than a keyed hex map, and which I love for just that reason.)
Now there almost certainly is no single thing that no setting ever should pay attention to. It always depends on what the focus and themes of the setting are and how players are supposed to interact with the world. There might very well be a setting somewhere out there were a paragraph on basketweaving might be really useful to have. But usually it isn't.

What would you consider to be things that published settings frequently go into detail for, but which really are almost completely pointless and only make it more difficult for the reader to pay attention to the book and not accidentally skip parts that might actually be important?

[BootStrapTommy]

Hell, Michigan

Potentially apocryphal story says when the founder was asked what to name the town, he retorted "Name it Hell, for all I care." Which pretty much sums up Michiganders for ya.

And is handy fodder for "Hell freezes over" jokes. In Michigan, it happens every winter!

The first thing you need to understand about naming things is that you will never make any good names. All the names you come up with will suck.

Hey, Llöthlor, Mosaham Abramose, and Orquacourt are awesome names, thank you very much!

[Roxxy]

The only caveat is to make sure you use languages that your players don't speak. You're building a fantasy world, whatever pronunciation you decide on is the right one for your world, and it'll be easier for everyone if you don't have to risk players "correcting" you on your own names.

I pronounce it how I want to, and chalk it up to accent differences, linguistic exchange, places changing hands (something with a Japanese name in California isn't going to be pronounced in the a Japanese manner, it's going to be pronounced in an English manner (West Coast American, to be specific)), and creolization. Granted, my setting focuses mostly on areas that have been colonized, so that's easy enough to explain, and if you want to correct my pronunciation, you won't even be correct within the context of how the locals themselves speak.

[Roxxy]

I'm working on my Dungeons and Dragons/Pathfinder world's dieselpunk age, specifically their version of the EU. To make a long story short, a couple centuries past the world was under the control of the Celestial Bureaucracy. This organization was headed by demigod figures and their angelic armies, and kept humanity (elves, dwarves, magni, orcs, and others are all subspecies of human) safe from demons, dragons, fae, and other threats in exchange for service and obedience. The especially loyal were taught the secrets of divine magic. Though it kept humanity safe as best as it could manage, the Celestial Bureaucracy was a totalitarian organization that saw people as pawns to be used to acquire power, had massive factionalism and infighting issues, did not seem overly concerned with getting thousands of humans killed in wars between demigods, was hard into racial determinism and not into giving people freedom to choose their own destiny, gave the churches of individual demigods a massive amount of control over people's daily lives, and was absolutely brutal in suppressing any form of dissent. Eventually these shenanigans went too far, and the Celestial Bureaucracy was broken, most of the demigods were killed, the angels were stripped of their powers and forced to live as humans, and humans were left ruling over themselves. For the first century and a half, the demons and fae lacked the power to be too much of a threat do to how long the Celestial Bureaucracy had spend grinding them down, but they've had time to regain their strength with the organization destroyed. Now they are attacking more often and in larger numbers, to the point where the possibility of an invasion cannot be discounted, and humanity is responsible for dealing with the problem itself now.

That's where the Commonwealth of Nations come in. Formed in the wake of the Second Great War between human nations (this war was one of multiple power struggles in the wake of the collapse of the Celestial Bureaucracy), it was originally a strategic alliance in the "Americas" (I use Fantasy Counterpart Cultures Dragon Age/Golarion style) to intimidate enemies, but over time began trying to tie economies and societies of multiple nations together. Over time it grew over most of the "Americas" outside of the "Francosphere", especially after the Third Great War. Main powers within the Commonwealth were "Mexico", "Brazil", and "California", though "Californian" power is much more from trading and banking and cultural exports than industry or their military. This is about the time demons and fae began being a massive issue again, and the Commonwealth is afraid of what would happen if any nation were unable to control an incursion. Demons or fae with a solid power base would be very, very bad. This led to the formation of the Commonwealth Rangers, a paramilitary force that can fight these sorts of threats anywhere in the Commonwealth. If a nation is having trouble, the Rangers can reinforce them before the situation gets out of control. If a threat happens across national borders, the Rangers can step in because they have jurisdiction in all of the involved nations. If something happens at sea, the Rangers can step in. If a nation lacks the resources to field large enough security forces, the Rangers can bolster them so that they don't get overwhelmed and provide a nice base of power for a demonic army. The Commonwealth Rangers are the main focus of the story, as the player characters are all Rangers, and their adventures consist of fighting all these demons and fae and such.

The issue is defining who is in the Commonwealth of Nations. Most of the "Americas"? Yes. I wanted more, though, so I've thought of reasons to bring in some other areas. One of these is "Britain". "Britain" has lost her Empire and is exhausted from a massive war with "France", in which they relied upon Commonwealth support ("France has enough territory in the "Americas" that a lot of the Commonwealth got pulled into the war). "France" is vanquished, but "Britain" sustained a lot of damage (they had to beat back an invasion, and it wasn't pretty). With a hurting economy, the need to pay to rebuild large swathes of the nation, and security vulnerabilities left by the need to simultaneously occupy "France", maintain military commitments, and fight demons and fae, the Commonwealth was able to pressure "Britain" into joining. The Commonwealth wanted them because, current problems aside, their economy has the potential to be very strong, "Britain" has historically been an ally, the "British" military is strong and the ability to recruit veterans of the excellent "British" security forces into the Rangers is prized, and the Commonwealth does not want "Britain" to have problems with demons and fae. For this, the Commonwealth is willing to put a lot of money into rebuilding "Britain" and station a lot of Rangers there to bolster security. Surprisingly enough, the Commonwealth has also brought the "French" in. The idea is that rebuilding the "French" economy to be as strong as it once was and tying "French" society and the "French" economy into their framework is a good to avoid another war, because a bunch of rich "French" people with close economic ties and a friendly relationship are unlikely to support the idea of another war. The Commonwealth is also responsible for occupying "French" territory worldwide in the wake of the war, so it bears responsibility for protecting and rebuilding that land anyway. "Vietnam" was "French", and overseas "French" colonies like "Louisiana" and "Argentina" are considered integral parts of "France" (this was done in an attempt to prevent independence movements). While most colonies accept this to some degree, "Vietnam" declared independence after "France" surrendered. The "British" and the Commonwealth didn't want a colonial or civil war breaking out over this (this was right before the "British" joined), and "France" was at their mercy, given that they were under a military occupation, so a deal was reached that independence would be granted, "Vietnam" would agree be a member of the Commonwealth, and the Commonwealth would invest in the new country. Several of the "Chinese" states (no, the area isn't unified as one nation) were gained as a result of them needing assistance with security issues (both internal and external) and wanted better economic ties, and "Japan" is the latest and most shocking gain. In the wake of an electoral upset came a brand new regime, which saw joining the Commonwealth as a way to give a seemingly directionless and depressed society a new and exciting cause without repeating disastrous nationalistic war mongering behavior that created the current "Korea" situation, jumpstart a flagging economy, and provide a resolution to the disastrous "Korean" occupation ("Japan" failed in this conquest and needed to accept "Korean" independence, but the "Korean" Democratic Union wasn't strong enough to take control of the country, which would boil over back into "Japan". The "KDU" demands full "Japanese" withdrawal, however, and the "Japanese" people mostly demand the same, seeing the war as an obvious failure that should be ended. If the "KDU" is willing to be part of the Commonwealth, this full withdrawal can take place, and the Commonwealth will provide development aid and "California" and "Mexico" will provide the assistance of their security forces, allowing the "KDU" to establish full control without the "Japanese" having to be involved. This proved acceptable to all parties, providing the Commonwealth with another superpower member and a new nation with a lot of potential, and ensuring that a violent war that could provide weaknesses for demons to exploit doesn't happen.). All of a sudden, a lot of "Asia" is Commonwealth, which is something they are trying to exploit so they can expand further within the region (The Commonwealth is very expansionist in its foreign policy. They would love it if they could count the whole world as members.). They'd love more of "Europe", but know damn well that isn't going to happen at the moment, and they are looking for inroads in "Africa" but haven't found anything yet (I should note that "Europe" didn't colonize "Africa").

Does this feel like I am reaching too much to get all the adventure locations I wanted (This is an RPG setting, and the players are all Commonwealth Rangers, so everything takes place in Commonwealth countries)? I'm trying to figure out if I went too far. As it stands, the Commonwealth of Nations contains a good third of the world's people, which I can handle, but I don't know how it seems to others.

[Roxxy]

I've decided to stop beating around the bush, and openly set my world in Earth. Magic has always been around, and the old Gods (Asgardians, Olympians, the like) had differing policies on its use. The Celestial Bureaucracy replaced the old Gods, and was rather strict, restricting divine magic to favored servants and banning arcane magic. Witches were hunted and executed for the grevious crime of practicing arcane magic, and the D&D/Pathfinder Druid class represented witches who unlawfully got the secrets of divine magic instead of arcane magic. A Sorcerer would be enslaved instead of executed, since their magic is inborn. With the fall of the Celestial Bureaucracy, arcane magic is no longer banned, and Wizards exist.

Rambling aside, real world, with magic having always been a thing. Superior in the sense that I use fantasy counterpart cultures so close to the real mpting they are barely distinguishable, so why distinguish? Can still have elves and such, since magic. Addresses my difficulty in doing good planet scale cartography by providing a ready made world map. Doesn't really invalidate anything within my setting. Makes some things easier to describe. Antarctica be weird, though. Outer ring of ice, but get past that? The flying islands are the least strange thing going on.

[Tzi]

Since people have decided to stop beating around bushes, I think I've come to a fun D&D decision. I've decided not to map my world very much.

This new revision of my world has a roughly decided upon continents with only a few geographic certainties.

1. Inverted Geography: Much of the worlds landmasses are actually in the Southern Hemisphere. A SMALL point but it means the rugged Ice born people are "Men of the South," and the warmer fairer weather is in the north for most people.
2. Renaissance era technology with SOME advanced relics and some steam technology.
3. The world is called Astyria, it is the second planet from its parent Star(s). It has one moon.
4. Humans only world, so more A song of Ice and Fire and less Tolkien
5. Most of the Drama of the world will center around One country. (Most campaigns will be in one developed story wise country with threads linking elsewhere.
6. The Calender year starts with allegedly the emergence of mankind onto the world. The year is 5558.

To keep things simple, Tarminia is the name for a large oblong peninsula jutting out from the northern area of Madarra (The worlds main contiguous landmass) Running East-West with its western province being in the ocean and its east bordering the rest of the world.

History:

Spoiler

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The country was once a province of a the great Lydian Empire from the years 3803 till 4167 At which point the Lydian Empire collapsed after the eruption in 4165 of the Caldera Parposus that sat in the Sea of Seraph betwixt the Heartland of Estraus and blanketed the Parpan prairie lands and the rich grain land of Khemit in fire, brimstone and dreaded fire elementals. The Ruin of Parposus cast the world into a long 3 year winter and the great cataclysm caused a great tsunami to consume countless coastal cities which had been the mainstay of the Naval Lydian Empire.

Than called Tarmos Major and Tarmos Minor, the province decimated. Its northern coastal cities washed away save for Igda, which was renamed Tarmos as the new capital for a time, and a few inland forts and a farming hubs, the provinces coastal ports were gone.

In 4276 the Khemitic refugees whom had flooded in from the north east for a decade and a half began to agitate under the rule of Tarmos as a city state spawning a brief civil war. The Khemitic uprising was suppressed in 4281 but only after the western tip of the peninsula was colonized by "Sea People," whom are described as "Of the Race of Acyri." (Which in my worlds context correlates to the massive subcontinent with a lot of Asian themes and Kingdoms) They quickly colonized the western fringe and proved ruggedly difficult to dislodge from the rocky crags and many islands of the western edge. By 4283 records account that they held "A great stronghold in Boonsalat, and routinely demanded tribute from the river-lands." Though some in Tarmos blamed them for the plague that spread in the Riverlands and the Uplands in 4285 and '87. The southern coast and fringe, long a no-mans land beyond the rugged peaks of "The Fangs," as they were called was colonized by a race from the Southern extreme. Beginning in Successive waves a race speaking Maebitic languages settled along the southern coast-lands nestled tightly within the southern fringe between the sea and the fangs. From 4294 till about 4370s, successive waves of colonization from Islands and lands in the far south saw the arrival of a people later called "Ikani," into the thickly forested south. Setting up their rugged kingdoms in Burch and oak forests and rainy lands of the far south. After the second Khemitic uprising in 4298 and the Horon rebellion established the City State of Horun in the eastern quarter of the peninsula, Tarmos focused heavily on diplomacy and negotiations. Conceding parts of the Riverlands to the Ikani kingdom called Llynna, leading to an overall Maebitic cultural expansion and cementing their hold on the south and the Fangs. Though Horun launched 3 seperate grizzly military campaigns onto their eastern areas and successfully crippled the lesser kingdom of Hylla in the east which led to all Ikani being ruled by Llynna in 4460.

From that, things waxed and waned between 4 dominate powers. Boonsalat in the west (A somewhat Cambodian inspired territory), Llynna in the South (Celtic, Cornish, Welsh, Gaelic) Tarmos to the North West (Minoan, Carthaginian) and Horun in the North East (Egypt, Berber, Ethiopian)

Also in the 4460s vast religious changes happened particularly in the north. Via the eastern Horun, the Sabylian born religion of Nazraeli and its Shepherd Cult spread into the territory creating vast religious frictions as successive waves of missionaries and uprising occurred. Particularly between the Horun and Llynna. Attempts to militarily conquer them also occupied religious missionizing which were hotly resisted. In 4471 the King of the City State of Tarm converted, King Justinian the Third adopted the faith and established an episcopal order were as Horun was often chaotic due to Zealot orders within the nation. Leading to the Convocations in Thera across the sea to declare the Tarmos to be the See of the area and crowned Basil the First as the "Shepherd of Shepherds," and Patriarch of the Temple of Nazraeli which was later built in 4479 in the city of Valentar around the frontiers of both Tarmos and Horun.

Llynna remained largely unconverted but began loosing ground after the 4500's as missionary activities and the gray area of the boundaries between realms became shifty. Llynna and its Maebitic culture formerly expanding far north of the Fangs slowly retreated south to the Fangs were it remained till the present. By 5200's and beyond most nearly all areas north of the Fangs and the Butcher Block lands were De-Maebized and linguistically Tarmanian and or Horunian and largely practiced the Nazraeli religion. South of the Fangs in traditional Llynna the older faiths reigned and indeed the Kingdom of Llynna became fiercely conservative and hostile to outsiders causing it to gain a reputation as a somewhat insular and culturally strange place. Boonsalat was missionized but formed break away churches after the 5100's.

Since 5310 attempts have been raging to unify the Country into one political entity with on and off success. Llynna has fallen a few times but nobody was able to hold it and thus their armies fell back and Llynna reasserted itself. Boonsalat is dependent more and more on Llynna for timber and Tarmos for food, but commands the sea lanes and can make life hell for anyone. Horun controls a lot of agricultural land and land trade routes and Tarmos holds a lot of agriculture, strategic positions AND more importantly the city of Tarm and its surrounding mountains have rich gold and silver mines.

Seem interesting?

[Yora]

What is it about? What kind of campaign would it be?

[Tzi]

What is it about? What kind of campaign would it be?

The country has off and on been united. Tarmos, or Tarma has in modern times been able to move in and eventually conquer the peninsula. Moving from a new capital of Valentyr, Tarmania is formed from military conquest and gradual attempts at cultural assimilation and in recent history attempts to modernize the nation.

Change has come after the deposing of the last king, Megistus II after a rebellion started from his religious reforms (Which were not popular in the periphery territories). Namely he had the idea to try and create greater Religious Unity as had existed in other Countries, but this was unlikely to fly as breakaway faiths from the older Nazraeli Orthodoxy were spawning as well as a few local cults still surviving in the rural hinterlands. Particularly the Duchy of Llynna whose Maebitic culture remains strong south of the Fangs. He was seen as far to liberal and permissive or retrograde in an era when the Senate is increasingly dominated by "New Believers," or reform minded Nazraeli faithful. From Pietists, to the intense Theodorian Reformers, the new and much more intense modes of faith are popular with the Northern Tarmanian port cities and its growing middle class. This led to a growing power struggle between the quasi-elected Senate and the Crown. The Crown ultimately lost, its supporters being driven into the Hinterlands and periphery of the country. Megistus is captured eventually but by then a simple feud over religious policy, and a question of political authority had fractured the country into about 4 small pieces.

Since then a military dictatorship has arisen after the Senate voted to execute Megistus II. Partly to try and maintain order and run the new country under a dictatorship. However the main army has been claimed by a religious fanatic. Leading to a reign of terror in the north and the Duchy of Llynna seceding altogether. In the east, "Old Believers," Refuse the new dictator Parthenius religious reforms. His outright ban on the "Old Religions," particularly the southerns Maebitic cults are deemed illegal and any practitioners not protected by Llynna and its newly fashioned army are flooding south over the mountains.

In the west Boonsalat also will not renounce its religious pluralism, and in the Country proper the Senate is obviously displeased that the man chosen to defeat Megistus II and his Royalist forces was now a dictator himself whom decided WHO could be Senators and who couldn't.

So the current situation...

1. Civil War: Tarmania is split between Tarmania proper or Tarma, Horun in the east, Llynna in the South and Boonsalat in the West. Borders and frontiers shift but over the last ten years fighting has dragged on and on and while a brief Armistace was made it has since collapsed and fighting has resumed.
2. Competing Factions: Royalists, Pietists, Reformers, Senatarians, Revolutionaries, Old Believers, New Believers, and Clashing religions and ethnic identities turn a political dispute into an at times war of ethnic and spiritual supremecy.
3. Multiple plausible futures: The country could crown Parthenius King and start a new dynasty after order is restored (With player help), The country could shattered into 4 nations (With player help), another Dynasty could ascend (With player help) or Democracy? Nah probably not but WITH PLAYER HELP?! maybe.

[Yora]

But what kinds of people would the players play and what kinds of adventures do they go on? That's the thing that would really interest me as a player.

[Tzi]

But what kinds of people would the players play and what kinds of adventures do they go on? That's the thing that would really interest me as a player.

1. Go into Politics! Maybe align yourself with a faction and work to restitch the country back together again under the ideology or noble you personally support. Engage in assassination, ballot rigging, ect. A civil war is an opportunity sometimes!
2. I love the smell of Secession in the morning! How about climb to the top of a new Kingdom you help start or found yourself? Its already a 7 part civil war, why not make it 8?
3. Backwoods horror! As this backdrop of strife and carnage is going on there is a degree of freedom spreading. New voices, new religions, new ideas are spreading and that isn't always a good thing. Help people survive, OR mix it up and start your own movement!

Currently the quest the players are on is a horror-investigation quest involving a shadowy cult. Called rather oddly "The Girls," it sprang out of a secularized monastic movement for woman near a small town called Ervin. Quickly however it gained a sinister reputation in the country side. Possibly because its relatively small membership were regarded as "odd looking," and or obnoxious as they were notable for being Puritanical cranks, annoying the tax collectors and civil administration and most cataclysmic were allegedly involved in horrible abuses of members and the capture and mutilation of children. The cult was destroyed when General Hector Magnus marched the 3 legion into the territory and seized their compound only to find the majority of the members ritually drank poison in a mass suicide, or were hung or had their throats slit. The Cults leaders however were captured alive. Samantha Hartlib, Evylin Grady, and Ryca Grady, all of whom were tried for heresy and hung and then burned as they choked on the gallows.

However.... over the last year strange creatures have emerged from the wooded thickets near the now empty foundation of the old home of "The Girls." Two people in old Ervin have seen Evylin Grady and her the screeching voice of Samantha. The dwindled remains of old Ervin have since abandoned their town. Likewise mysterious creatures have appeared in the bogs and thickets of the south west of the country. Making the region vary dangerous to cross, and a strange illness has befell a few towns.

The players have been sent in to investigate. The players serve Commander Hamish Byru, who is part of a faction of the rebelling and royalist southern hinterland territories. Hamish is hoping to clear this province and use it as a stepping stone to wreak havoc in the north and force a permanent peace settlement to grant his province either total independence or restore the old monarchy.

[Grinner]

The players have been sent in to investigate. The players serve Commander Hamish Byru, who is part of a faction of the rebelling and royalist southern hinterland territories. Hamish is hoping to clear this province and use it as a stepping stone to wreak havoc in the north and force a permanent peace settlement to grant his province either total independence or restore the old monarchy.

I like this. You've got something for the players to do immediately and have also set expectations for the future.

Well done.

[Tzi]

I like this. You've got something for the players to do immediately and have also set expectations for the future.

Well done.

Currently the players are investigating the cult, or chasing Samantha Hartlib. The mysterious plague is believed linked to her, though how she cheated death (Necromancy duh) is a mystery. Hamish holds a personal grudge against her as she may have murdered a friend of his. Also her likely responsibility for the plague and misfortunes of this region gives the Arch-Mage Hamish pause when dealing with what could be a growing threat to every faction.

[Yora]

While the 20 quick questions for your campaign settings thread is going really well, it turned out that those 20 questions are really more advanced information about a setting you already know the basics of. But without knowing the basics, that information isn't actually making a lot of sense out of context.

What would you think would be good things to ask for 20 quick basic questions for your world?

[QED - Iltazyara]

What would you think would be good things to ask for 20 quick basic questions for your world?

One problem I noticed with it is that to answer the questions quickly, i.e. in brief, one has to draw comparisons with real world components of the settings. Cultural similarities, regional or climate, which I have avoided doing to the best of my ability elsewhere. Not a major downfall, but just one to note.

Some of the twenty questions are perfectly fine; the "Who is the Mightiest X" are certainly fitting, they explain tidbits that a player would want to know without going over their head too much.
But questions like "Where are we?" and "What's the weather like?" are needed for pretty basic information, if you want to use them for an introduction.

For no-standard cosmologies (my setting being one) a question like "What does the night sky look like?" is certainly valid; there are two moons, four large flying islands, an enormous tower, but only three constellations. No other stars in the sky; which is something that is a pretty big different.
I think doing a world description paragraph, in brief, would be a good thing to add along with the twenty questions as is.
Maybe the current issue is that the questions are all somewhat Meta; what players would want as information to do something, rather than things the player would know upfront about the world. Knowing the world is a moon orbiting a gas giant is interesting, but provides no information directly correlating to what the players can do. Yet, if they don't know it, some of the world's sayings, or cultures, may not make any sense.

Twenty questions is probably the right number of questions; more than that gets rather long, less doesn't answer enough. It's also somewhat of a memetic number for questions, so people are more likely to read twenty than say, twenty one or nineteen.

[Milo v3]

But questions like "Where are we?" and "What's the weather like?" are needed for pretty basic information, if you want to use them for an introduction.

The problem with these type of questions is that I generally can't answer that until I have a plotline worked out and I make the setting before I make the plot. If a question is local it becomes impossible to answer in regards to a setting once the scale of the setting is large enough.

[QED - Iltazyara]

Considering the forum we're in; I think we all make the setting before the plot. But not knowing where you plan on starting a campaign, even of a regional level?
For me, the answer is something like "You are in the duchy of Ventra; one of seven human duchies in the former Realm of Men. The duchy is secure, but faces external threats from the petty gnoll kingdoms across the western Warfields, occasional orcish raids to the south in the Lapirdum Mountains, and animosity from the dwarves of Davolf and the duchy of Ralm." and so on. There's no plot there, just general a political/environmental situation.

And, on another note, the questions are meant as an introduction to a campaign and setting. As such, these should be done later, or be continuously edited until the game actually starts play.

[Roxxy]

At the moment, I feel like it is a good time to talk about what I want my world to feel like in terms of visual and storytelling themes, rather than describing specific nations, territories, history, or what have you. In essence, I want to talk about the overall purpose of the setting. This is a roleplaying game setting, which I designed with a modified version of the Pathfinder system in mind, but which could be ported over to Dungeons and Dragons 3.5. As such, this setting is designed for long term use over multiple stories with many protagonists, and the rules of the game do influence my worldbuilding choices.

I suppose I should start with the overarching theme of the world. Since this is a roleplaying setting, the most important thing is what the player characters are doing. The role of the player characters can be summed up in a quote I am quite fond of, whose author is unknown:

"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."

As I build my world, I am noticing that I have a definite tendency to create a setting that is optimistic, and in many ways a place I would enjoy living. This is quite at odds with the need to provide a plethora of problems for adventurers to address, and the solution I came upon is to not have adventurers. I do lean towards high technology levels and centralized governments, and the police aren’t necessarily fond of vigilantism. I also imagine that a centralized government which exists in a world where spellcasters, demons, dragons, fae, sea monsters, kaiju, the undead, and various other magical things exist openly would have people trained to deal with them when they pose a threat. Otherwise, the world wouldn’t be a particularly pleasant place to live. This is a perfect role for the player characters, as it provides instant and unlimited motivation for conflict. They go out and fight monsters because they are the government agents tasked with doing this. The world seems so pleasant because brave men and women stand ever vigilant, constantly fighting, bleeding, and all too often dying to keep the dark side of the world contained.

As to the cultural flavor of the world, I am used to most of my fantasy being Western European or perhaps East Asian, but I wanted to move beyond those roots while still embracing them. I do this by taking a lot of inspiration from my native California. I based the terrain of my most focused-on country on the US West Coast, along with a lot of cultural elements of the setting. I really like a California/Cascadia focus as opposed to the standard Western Europe or East Asia focus, because California easily accepts Western European and East Asian themes at the same time, whilst leaving room for more. Mixing British, Mediterranean, East Asian, Southeast Asian, South Asian, American Indian, Latin American, Polynesian, Middle Eastern, Germanic, and African themes together in something highly reminiscent of California feels completely right to me. The idea of California based fantasy does suggest a high degree of multiculturalism and a mostly immigrant or immigrant-descended populace, and the variety that provides is wonderful. I do include a much greater East Asian, especially Chinese, influence than real life California had, to the level that people speak a creole language based primarily on English, Chinese, and Spanish with influence from several other languages, notably Italian, Japanese, and Greek. There isn’t a majority racial group at all, with Western Europeans and East Asians being neck and neck as to who is a plurality of the population, and a significant portion of the population is neither.

When it comes to technology, I bundle it together with art. I do this because I tend to decide my technology based on what looks cool, making it in effect a matter of artistic desires. As such, the prominent visual artistic elements and the prominent technology are somewhat interrelated to my mind. Though I prefer a very high technology setting, based largely within 20th Century technology as opposed to Medieval technology, I have about as much an eye towards avoiding anachronisms and accurately depicting the time period my setting is based off of as Dungeons and Dragons has. A lot of technology is heavily used because I thought it looked pretty and no other reason. For example, I like trains. The dominant style of train is based on the early EMD F series, such as the F3. This is because the F3 is downright gorgeous:





When I think of transportation in my setting, that is one of the first things I think of. As an urban planning student focusing on transportation, I think about the subject a lot. I really like public transit, so, while my setting most certainly does have automobiles and airlines, trains, streetcars, subway, and busses are all big. And the old PCC streetcars aren’t exactly bad looking:



My setting most certainly has these. Even a 1950s Greyhound is a looker:



Yet another thing for my setting to borrow. A pattern is forming with my choices of vehicles, of course, and it continues with cars:







A clear image is coming along, in which is is very much a 40s-60s setting in terms of technology. Might as well match that with popular culture. That means early rock & roll and surf rock. Elvis and the Beach Boys are obvious inspirations, though I imagine some East Asian elements have crept in. Also major Mexican inspiration. This boils over to food, too. Modified versions of Chinese and Mexican cuisine are not just ubiquitous, these modifications form a recognizable national culinary tradition. This is still very much in development, however. I’m trying to put a lot of thought into what an Anglo-Sino-Latin creole should look and feel like, and most of the research isn’t done yet. Pop culture needs to be much more than just Elvis and surfing (That isn’t even any sort of innovation, really.), and actually have some unique aspects to it that real life California lacks, and it will when I’m done.

Airplanes, and here is where I started doing weirder stuff. All aircraft use propellers or rotors, because I think propellor driven airplanes are sexy in a way jets just aren’t. Especially the Corsair.



I love it so much, I wrote dragons in such a way that the most effective way to fight them is a spellcaster piloting a fighter. Dragons versus wizard fighter pilots in Corsairs. Yes.

I also really like hueys. So we have helicopters kinda like that. Also flying boats:



I love Catalinas.

Weapons-wise, assault rifles, shotguns, and such are pretty ubiquitous. Tanks are about mid-50s level.

On the subject of magic, I wrote it in such a way that enchantments have to constantly be recast, because they don’t last. This makes maintaining magic items extremely difficult. For government agents who themselves have some knowledge of magic (even a Fighter knows something about ki, which is inherently magical) and the resources of the government, this is not an insurmountable problem, but in industrial capacities magic is used to do things in the moment, not to create items that are themselves magic. Enchanted items are the playthings of the rich, who can afford to maintain them. In fact, wizardry itself is the province of the rich and powerful, because they can afford the necessary instruction. Sorcery is inborn spellcasting ability, and do to the law of numbers, is associated with the lower income masses. It is also dangerous, with the modern day being the first time Sorcerers were more likely to survive to adulthood than blow themselves up during puberty. Needless to say, people find them scary. Sorcery is as old as civilization, but wizardry is fairly new. There are also divine spellcasters, who practice a magic passed down from the long disappeared old gods to their priesthoods. Those who practice this magic outside the priesthoods are witches, and while they aren’t executed anymore, historically they were, as practicing such magic without proper sanction was a grave offense indeed.

Religion in this setting is complicated. At one point there were gods, yes, but people don’t know where they went. They were replaced by the Celestial Bureaucracy, who took control of the priesthoods as the so-called children of the gods. This organization was headed by these demigod figures and their angelic armies, and kept humanity (elves, dwarves, magni, orcs, and others are all subspecies of human) safe from demons, dragons, fae, and other threats in exchange for service and obedience. The especially loyal were taught the secrets of divine magic. Though it kept humanity safe as best as it could manage, the Celestial Bureaucracy was a totalitarian organization that saw people as pawns to be used to acquire power, had massive factionalism and infighting issues, did not seem overly concerned with getting thousands of humans killed in wars between demigods, was hard into racial determinism and not into giving people freedom to choose their own destiny, gave the churches of individual demigods a massive amount of control over people's daily lives, and was absolutely brutal in suppressing any form of dissent. Eventually these shenanigans went too far, and the Celestial Bureaucracy was broken, most of the demigods were killed, the angels were stripped of their powers and forced to live as humans, and humans were left ruling over themselves. For the first century and a half, the demons and fae lacked the power to be too much of a threat do to how long the Celestial Bureaucracy had spend grinding them down, but they've had time to regain their strength with the organization destroyed. Which is exactly why the player characters are needed.

With the fall of the Celestial Bureaucracy, the priesthoods maintain faith in the old gods (it is known for a fact that at some point they were real, after all), and many people do continue to worship, but agnosticism and lack of faith that the old gods will ever return are common, as well as questions about whether their return would actually be desirable.

A demon is an emotion with a physical form. Just one emotion. A succubus feels only constant lust, and nothing else. A rage demon only ever feels anger. It's why demons can't really be called evil, despite being a constant threat. They literally cannot comprehend how to be anything but what they are. They also aren't people, in that they are made, not born. A fae has more emotional depth than a demon, but is still narrow in what it is capable of feeling. They do tend to be rule driven, but their rules can seem rather chaotic and perplexing, and some fae seem to follow rules that encourage chaos. Some are relatively benign or even helpful, but dangerous if crossed, while others are just bad. There are some that steal children. Like demons, fae are usually made, not born (with several exceptions), and therefore have a much more fixed personality than a human (a gnome will act as a gnome acts, because gnomes are made and lack any sort of genetic variation). Incidentally, the argument has been made that the Celestial Bureaucracy's problem was in trying to treat humans as if they were fae, which, if true, would be problematic in that humans differ from each other and fae do not. It would explain why the Celestial Bureaucracy believed in racial determinism so much, as such an attitude could work if you were dealing with fae instead of people. People don’t know what dragons are, just that they have been around longer than anything else except possibly the gods, have a deep wealth of knowledge, possess powerful magic in true Dungeons and Dragons style, and they are easily provoked. Most of them aren’t immediately hostile, just aloof and largely isolationist, but there are a lot of dragons in the mountains, and enough of them try to exert dominance over humans to make dragonslayers a necessity.

So, there is some of the basic theme and flavor. Do ask questions. Need ideas for what to write next, but right now I need sleep.

[zabbarot]

Considering the forum we're in; I think we all make the setting before the plot. But not knowing where you plan on starting a campaign, even of a regional level?

This made me laugh just a little bit. Like the questions were for casual worldbuilders who just want to run a game, and this forum is for hardcore worldbuilders.

[Tzi]

While the 20 quick questions for your campaign settings thread is going really well, it turned out that those 20 questions are really more advanced information about a setting you already know the basics of. But without knowing the basics, that information isn't actually making a lot of sense out of context.

What would you think would be good things to ask for 20 quick basic questions for your world?

1. What is the State? I.E. Are states modern Nation-States with common ethno-linguistic ties? Are they fuedelistic entities of landlords loyal to warlords? Are they vast multi-ethnic empires? Are they small tribal clan holdings?
2. What drives history? Do people understand history as the History of countries or as the history of regions? Or the history of peoples?
3. Is there private land ownership? What is property?
4. Is there ethnic-linguistic-cultural diversity? This is more obvious in my sorts of worlds were there is typically ONE or only a handful of fantasy races. If there is what is its origin? OR what is the percieved origin?
5. What is a Dragon?
6. What does the sky day/night look like and how to people on the ground percieve it? I.E. do the planets have mythological names?

[Milo v3]

Considering the forum we're in; I think we all make the setting before the plot. But not knowing where you plan on starting a campaign, even of a regional level?

Nope. Since I make a campaign setting, rather than a campaign, and then I make campaigns within that campaign setting in different locations.

[Yora]

I think I am about to do, what I usually say people should never do. I think I'll be calling my elves something else.
They are elves. There is really no trace of pretense that these people would be something new and original or "totally not elves".

But in the entire setting, I am not using English names for anything but some common animals. Instead, all people and places have names that are in the native language of the people who live there. The beastmen don't call themselves beastmen and lizardmen don't call themselves lizardmen. Other characters might describe them as that, but their names are kaas and lakiak. And there is much more Asian stuff than European stuff in the setting. Calling the elves elves just doesn't seem right. That's an English name and nobody names anything in English.
So I think I am going to call them something else.

[zabbarot]

I think I am about to do, what I usually say people should never do. I think I'll be calling my elves something else.
They are elves. There is really no trace of pretense that these people would be something new and original or "totally not elves".

But in the entire setting, I am not using English names for anything but some common animals. Instead, all people and places have names that are in the native language of the people who live there. The beastmen don't call themselves beastmen and lizardmen don't call themselves lizardmen. Other characters might describe them as that, but their names are kaas and lakiak. And there is much more Asian stuff than European stuff in the setting. Calling the elves elves just doesn't seem right. That's an English name and nobody names anything in English.
So I think I am going to call them something else.

I did the same thing recently for mostly the same reasons. Though the elves I have are ageless because of seasonal blood sacrifice. They're sort of Mayan/Mexica inspired so I gave them an in-world name to fit that. Otherwise I just call them elves though.