Worldbuilding Talk Thread

[Tzi]

I'm looking to build a culture with multiple different inspirations.

The government is essentially a theocratic version of the viking system of clans and laws. The environment that they live in is a coastal forest/jungle region that lacks metal of any kind. The religion has two distinct pantheons that engage in frequent "prank wars" and constant attempts at one upping the other. The two king deities are the god of knowledge, and the god of death.

The K'otl, the deities governing more "civilized" concepts, are loosely based on Aztec mythology while the Luon, the deities governing the more natural concepts, are very, very loosely based on the Loa from the trolls of World of Warcraft. Both pantheons would be considered very dark pantheons. Despite being less than light or traditionally deities, they are still very much a positive force.

The thing is, I've hit a mental roadblock on how to combine all of these into one society.

Conceptually it might be hard. I think the first way to get by the roadblock would be to maybe pick a common linguistic title or toolkit to describe these all.

So, for one of my cultures its well mostly Welsh/Cornish/Breton inspired. I use those words to describe their world and customs, even the stuff that isn't welsh. For example the rhyfelwr serol, or Astral Warriors are basically taking the core concept of Sailor Moon.... errr Reincarnating Demi-Goddesses that fight evil and a reincarnating Princess whom eventually leads the world into the Silver Millinium in a Crystal magic city and made into a religion. Now obviously calling it the Sailor Senshi would seem silly. So I used Welsh or Cornish words that roughly MEAN those things to describe some of the culturally alien parts. But I think you'll have a trouble if there isn't a core theme.

If say they are sort of Viking like..... many use Nordic or Swedish terms?

[Jendekit]

Conceptually it might be hard. I think the first way to get by the roadblock would be to maybe pick a common linguistic title or toolkit to describe these all.

...

If say they are sort of Viking like..... many use Nordic or Swedish terms?

With one exception...okay two exceptions, that could probably work. In the setting that I've built these guys into, they are one of only two peoples that have access to true Divine magic. The other peoples have an animistic based faith, so the theocratic vikings (I am beginning to like the way that sounds) are the only faith that have clear proof of their gods.

So the names of the deities and their pantheons will have a decidedly non-Nordic feel to them, but for the other parts of the society, that could work.

Now I need to actually come up with more than two gods, and taboos beyond the mere existence of undead.

Come to think of it, are there any real world religions where the god of death was the head honcho?

[Bharaeth]

Not sure if it's of interest, not being familiar with WoW, but it sounds like they borrowed the term 'loa' from vodun/voodoo, which is the name for the spirits revered in that religion. And I think Baron Samedi, one of their death gods, is pretty significant in the pantheon, even if not at the top

[zabbarot]

Not sure if it's of interest, not being familiar with WoW, but it sounds like they borrowed the term 'loa' from vodun/voodoo, which is the name for the spirits revered in that religion. And I think Baron Samedi, one of their death gods, is pretty significant in the pantheon, even if not at the top

Voodoo* pantheons are different depending on who you ask. There are multiple families of Loa and Baron Samedi is part of the Ghede family. His place in that family also changes depending on who you ask. He's either one of the Ghede, the one who protects the Ghede, or an aspect of them. It's important to keep in mind that Voodoo is a living religion, and the main difference between it and other West African religions is that it's intermixed with with Catholicism. The Loa are intermediaries for an overdeity, much like the Catholic saints are in Catholicism. I think this is about as far as we can discuss it within board rules. >.>

*it's Voodoo in Louisiana, no that's not disrespectful. There are like 6 ways to spell it based on geographical location.

Come to think of it, are there any real world religions where the god of death was the head honcho?

Honestly, Odin might be the only one and his place as a death god is mostly because he died once. Death deities tend to be secondary, or antagonistic. Amun-Ra could sort of count, since Ra is Horus and Horus fused with Osiris(his father, and god of death). But Amun-Ra is never treated as a death god, despite the sort of inherited characteristics

[IZ42]

Good ol' Huitzilopotchli is a sort of death god (sacrifice to be exact), does that count?

Edit: Poking around on Wiki, it appears that the Supreme Fiji god, Degei, was the judge of the dead.

Edit 2: Donn, the Irish lord of the dead is regarded as the father of the Irish Race, does that count? The Wiccan Horned God appears to guide the souls of the undead to the underworld, and rules equally with the Goddess.

[zabbarot]

Good ol' Huitzilopotchli is a sort of death god (sacrifice to be exact), does that count?

I would argue that it doesn't because they had an actual death god(several actually). Also Huitzilopotchli was a war god, because hummingbirds are known for their war like nature.

[IZ42]

I would argue that it doesn't because they had an actual death god(several actually). Also Huitzilopotchli was a war god, because hummingbirds are known for their war like nature.

Dude, Hummingbirds are the most mean little buggers ever.

Continuing with major Death Gods, Nga appears to be co-principal deity along with Num among the Nenets of Siberia. Mictlantecuhtli was a principal god of the aztecs, and Jabru was the father of the Elamite gods.

[Bharaeth]

Good ol' Huitzilopotchli is a sort of death god (sacrifice to be exact), does that count?

Edit 2: Donn, the Irish lord of the dead is regarded as the father of the Irish Race, does that count? The Wiccan Horned God appears to guide the souls of the undead to the underworld, and rules equally with the Goddess.

I think the Dagda and/or Beli was the father of the gods, though, and Danu the mother, who was arguably most significant

[Yora]

I am currently working on a bare bones history for my setting that just covers a few major events in the last couple of centuries which explain how the currently ongoing conflicts had started and what the original goal of the involved parties were.
I think a great idea would be to have two of these events being a big plague and a very large volcanic erruption. But I am still mostly blank on what longterm effects these could have had that still affect the continent today?

With the plague, I like the idea that the disease still shows up occasionally in remote areas and people are then freaking out about it spreading through the civilized areas again. I think it also only affects humans and elves, but not lizardmen, beastmen, and goblins. And it probably shouldn't be too long ago, so that most people know about it. Maybe 100 years or so.

With the volcano I am really not sure what to do. Causing a year of darkened sky with a draught and famine following it seems the way to start, but so far I have no good idea how that could be connected to other important disruptions of the region. (The volcano is in a region that is known for many passages to the Underworld.)

Any spontaneous ideas you could throw me?

[TheWombatOfDoom]

I am currently working on a bare bones history for my setting that just covers a few major events in the last couple of centuries which explain how the currently ongoing conflicts had started and what the original goal of the involved parties were.
I think a great idea would be to have two of these events being a big plague and a very large volcanic erruption. But I am still mostly blank on what longterm effects these could have had that still affect the continent today?

With the plague, I like the idea that the disease still shows up occasionally in remote areas and people are then freaking out about it spreading through the civilized areas again. I think it also only affects humans and elves, but not lizardmen, beastmen, and goblins. And it probably shouldn't be too long ago, so that most people know about it. Maybe 100 years or so.

With the volcano I am really not sure what to do. Causing a year of darkened sky with a draught and famine following it seems the way to start, but so far I have no good idea how that could be connected to other important disruptions of the region. (The volcano is in a region that is known for many passages to the Underworld.)

Any spontaneous ideas you could throw me?

The plague could actually be thought to be connected to the Volcano errupting, and it very well could, considering its connections to the underworld. The ash could have spread to a variety of areas via airborn spread and over time, only some of the larger chunks of obsidian or some such rock blasted from the erruption to remote areas, causing this sickness to resurge every once and awhile, as people discover them, die off, and others rediscover it later. There could even be shrines dedicated to these "death stones", or sealed areas where people have closed off access to these deadly things.

If the volcano has any more minor erruptions, it could cause things to return. What other important disruptions are you referring to?

[Yora]

I don't know. That's my question.

Having the plague caused by the volcano would mean having only one notable event instead of two. But the volcano releasing a cloud of supernatural toxic gas would be a cool idea. There could be minor erruptions of that kind in the mountains all the time, but that one time it spread to a huge area outside of what is known as the high danger zone. That's the mysery coming to your home, inviting you to come and investigate it. That's great.

[zabbarot]

I am currently working on a bare bones history for my setting that just covers a few major events in the last couple of centuries which explain how the currently ongoing conflicts had started and what the original goal of the involved parties were.
I think a great idea would be to have two of these events being a big plague and a very large volcanic erruption. But I am still mostly blank on what longterm effects these could have had that still affect the continent today?

With the plague, I like the idea that the disease still shows up occasionally in remote areas and people are then freaking out about it spreading through the civilized areas again. I think it also only affects humans and elves, but not lizardmen, beastmen, and goblins. And it probably shouldn't be too long ago, so that most people know about it. Maybe 100 years or so.

With the volcano I am really not sure what to do. Causing a year of darkened sky with a draught and famine following it seems the way to start, but so far I have no good idea how that could be connected to other important disruptions of the region. (The volcano is in a region that is known for many passages to the Underworld.)

Any spontaneous ideas you could throw me?

Additionaly, this could be used alongside or the volcano idea or without it. You have three races that you've decided are immune. They could be carriers like rats were for the bubonic plague. If that's true expect additional racism as a side effect. If those races are inherently evil, then this is icing, if they're not it will likely make them more difficult to play in a mixed party (but at least the enmity would have a logical root for once :P)

[redwizard007]

I am currently working on a bare bones history for my setting that just covers a few major events in the last couple of centuries which explain how the currently ongoing conflicts had started...

*snip*

Any spontaneous ideas you could throw me?

A few wars, or at the least large skirmishes.

Humanoid invasion or infestation.

Odd seasonal weather.

Unusual animal migration.

A coup or revolution.

A schism in a religious order.

Disputed succession of the crown.

Regional pogroms.

Discovery of precious metal, potentially on a border or contested area.

Feuding clans.

Regions lost to the wilderness after the plague.

A scarcity of prey animals.

That's all I've got off the top of my head.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

I've been interested lately in light-to-heavy horror themes in RPGs. Dishonored or the first Dragon Age game, when you really look into the lore or pay attention to the setting seem to give off this sense of despair I find thrilling. It's that sort of sadness one gets from contemplating death, but not just personal death. Both settings give me pause to think on, since in some way each deals with a very real and very near extinction-level event. But they avoid the "a million is a statistic" vibe by making every inch lost a personal tragedy. In Dishonored there are so many times when a glimpse into the lives of commoners or a snippet of in-universe lore makes you feel for the individuals caught up in a calamity too huge to be comprehended. Dragon Age Origins at times feels like a relentless assault upon civilization itself, to the point where it honestly would be a miracle if something good could be pulled from the nightmare enveloping the world.

So, I want to bring some of that to my players...but I don't know how necessarily. How do people here build settings that want to maximize despair and horror?

[Yora]

I would guess some kind of threat that is spreading and nobody has any idea how to stop it, but it's slow enough that people still have to grow food and maintain cities, because it's probably not going to kill them all in the next few weeks.

[ShadowFireLance]

So you have Geology and Astronomy, what do you call the 'Planeology' of a setting?

[Yora]

That's cosmology.

[ShadowFireLance]

That's cosmology.

I feel really stupid now.

[Jendekit]

Does anyone know of a website with listings of weapons from around the world that were made without metal? The two civilizations on Roaming Island don't have access to metal and outside of the ones provided in the Ultimate Equipment (macuahuitals, tiaha, mere, etc.) I'm having a hard time coming up with anything beyond simply taking the metal equipment and slapping an Ironwood spell on them.

My problem with simply doing that is those evolved in a culture that had easy access to metal, and on the Roaming Island there is no metal at all. I'm justifying 3 kinds of lamellar armor because the pieces act like scales on reptiles so I can mentally justify it having arisen.

[redwizard007]

Does anyone know of a website with listings of weapons from around the world that were made without metal? The two civilizations on Roaming Island don't have access to metal and outside of the ones provided in the Ultimate Equipment (macuahuitals, tiaha, mere, etc.) I'm having a hard time coming up with anything beyond simply taking the metal equipment and slapping an Ironwood spell on them.

My problem with simply doing that is those evolved in a culture that had easy access to metal, and on the Roaming Island there is no metal at all. I'm justifying 3 kinds of lamellar armor because the pieces act like scales on reptiles so I can mentally justify it having arisen.

Look to the Inuits, Aztecs and other native american civilizations as well as polynesians and aboriginal australians. You may have to substitute shell or coral for the stone (since... you know, turtle.)

Links to make life easy:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inuit_weapons

http://www.legendsandchronicles.com/...aztec-weapons/

http://www.mythichawaii.com/weapons.htm

http://www.mbantua.com.au/aboriginal-weapons/

[Milo v3]

That's cosmology.

Well... cosmology is "the scientific study of the large scale properties of the universe as a whole". So shouldn't there be another word that describes "the scientific study of the large scale properties of the multiverse as a whole."?

[IZ42]

Seeing as my questions got missed, I'll repost them here.

How would a Roche World affect normal humanoid behavior? How would things develop differently on a Roche World? Would the presumably odd gravity affect biology or life in general?

How long would it have taken to form new species or subspecies, assuming Elves, Dwarves, Orcs all split from humans into their own distinct species, adapted to various environments and gravitational pulls, yet are still related enough to interbreed and create viable offspring?

Expanding on these, how would life among an asteroid belt be affected and altered, assuming it was introduced and had adapted to living in such an environment?

[Mechalich]

Seeing as my questions got missed, I'll repost them here.

How would a Roche World affect normal humanoid behavior? How would things develop differently on a Roche World? Would the presumably odd gravity affect biology or life in general?

How long would it have taken to form new species or subspecies, assuming Elves, Dwarves, Orcs all split from humans into their own distinct species, adapted to various environments and gravitational pulls, yet are still related enough to interbreed and create viable offspring?

Expanding on these, how would life among an asteroid belt be affected and altered, assuming it was introduced and had adapted to living in such an environment?

Changing the impact of gravity in a significant way changes everything. At least, it does if you're being serious and hard sci-fi about it. D&D is not really good at being serious and hard sci-fi about anything, so it's really hard to say. Worth noting that, when trying to deal with the weirdness of differently sized space habitats with variable orbits, rotations, and so forth in Spelljammer they just changed the rules and made Earth-like gravity apply more or less everywhere.

That being said, a double planet system could work fairly normally, assuming the worlds were both able to have something like 1g gravity at the surface, but the big difference would be the massive tidal effects involved.

Also, technically being different species means you can't interbreed and produce viable offspring (viable generally meaning 'fertile'), that's one of the principal ways species are defined.

As for an asteroid belt, well, 'belt' is something of a misnomer. Even if asteroids are concentrated within a region of space, they are still widely dispersed. It's not the asteroid field in Empire Strikes Back. Each asteroid is essentially its own isolated micro-world, and while it might be easier to reach other nearby asteroids than to reach another planet - the average distance between main belt asteroids is 600,000 miles. For comparison, the distance between the Earth and the moon is 238,000 miles. Transit would require advanced technology or high-powered magic.

presumably asteroid life would be hyper-efficient and adapted to darkness, cold, and very low energy inputs. In a D&D context, it might be similar to life on the elemental plane of earth in some ways and the paraelemental plane of ice in others.

[Yora]

Well... cosmology is "the scientific study of the large scale properties of the universe as a whole". So shouldn't there be another word that describes "the scientific study of the large scale properties of the multiverse as a whole."?

Multiverse is a meaningless term, as "universe" already means "everything that exists". You can't have multiple everythings.

[IZ42]

Changing the impact of gravity in a significant way changes everything. At least, it does if you're being serious and hard sci-fi about it. D&D is not really good at being serious and hard sci-fi about anything, so it's really hard to say. Worth noting that, when trying to deal with the weirdness of differently sized space habitats with variable orbits, rotations, and so forth in Spelljammer they just changed the rules and made Earth-like gravity apply more or less everywhere.

That being said, a double planet system could work fairly normally, assuming the worlds were both able to have something like 1g gravity at the surface, but the big difference would be the massive tidal effects involved.

Also, technically being different species means you can't interbreed and produce viable offspring (viable generally meaning 'fertile'), that's one of the principal ways species are defined.

As for an asteroid belt, well, 'belt' is something of a misnomer. Even if asteroids are concentrated within a region of space, they are still widely dispersed. It's not the asteroid field in Empire Strikes Back. Each asteroid is essentially its own isolated micro-world, and while it might be easier to reach other nearby asteroids than to reach another planet - the average distance between main belt asteroids is 600,000 miles. For comparison, the distance between the Earth and the moon is 238,000 miles. Transit would require advanced technology or high-powered magic.

presumably asteroid life would be hyper-efficient and adapted to darkness, cold, and very low energy inputs. In a D&D context, it might be similar to life on the elemental plane of earth in some ways and the paraelemental plane of ice in others.

Thanks for the detail, Mechalich!

Tidal Forces would definitely be harshly affected now that I come to think of it. To give context on this world, one planet is slightly smaller than the other, akin to Charon and Pluto.

Well, assuming different subspecies, such as breeds of dogs or cats, which are close enough related for interbreeding with fertile offspring, how long would it have taken then?

My plan for the asteroid belt was that the 'grey' races of the underdark, as well as shadow plane races like the Fetchling and Wayang would live there, in remote colonies formed on dwarf planets and plutoids interspersed among the smaller asteroids, meaning the aforementioned races are farr less common than the regular races, and far more secluded and hermetic in their ways. This setting assumes 9th level spells are in play, just not as common as the Tippyverse, so spells like Interplanetary Teleport, and similar spells allow transot, as well as more mundane forms of space travel. Does this make more sense?

[Yora]

What's a Roche World? Your vague comments indicate something like a binary planet in a shared ball of gas. That would be impossible since the two planets could not hold on to such a huge atmosphere. Look how tiny the atmospheres of Earth and Venus are and Mars couldn't really hold on to anything. The closest thing I could think of would be to drop two tiny planets into a gas giant, but then air drag would slow them down and cause them to crush together into a single body.
If you want an impossible planet in a fantasy world but still want to keep it somewhat plausible, the only working solution is usually to put it into some kind of magical dimension.

How fast new subspieces evolve depends entirely on what kind of selection pressure you have. I think for domestic animals you can get pretty significant differences in just 10 generations or even less. Though in that case you have an extremely storng and very directed selection pressure (the breeder), while at the same time having the individuals that are allowed to breed very well fed and cared for. Animal breeding removes the vast majority of possible genetic combinations that would be perfectly able to survive in a natural environment.
However, it still stands that there is no standard rate of evolution. Sharks looked just like sharks when the dinosaurs were still around and barely changed at all. Yet you can change the color of an entire population of moths in just a single decade. Unless you do selective breeding, the number of factors and variables is incredibly huge. Sometimes you get tiny changes over huge amounts of times, at other times very radical changes very quickly.

[Tzi]

I've been interested lately in light-to-heavy horror themes in RPGs. Dishonored or the first Dragon Age game, when you really look into the lore or pay attention to the setting seem to give off this sense of despair I find thrilling. It's that sort of sadness one gets from contemplating death, but not just personal death. Both settings give me pause to think on, since in some way each deals with a very real and very near extinction-level event. But they avoid the "a million is a statistic" vibe by making every inch lost a personal tragedy. In Dishonored there are so many times when a glimpse into the lives of commoners or a snippet of in-universe lore makes you feel for the individuals caught up in a calamity too huge to be comprehended. Dragon Age Origins at times feels like a relentless assault upon civilization itself, to the point where it honestly would be a miracle if something good could be pulled from the nightmare enveloping the world.

So, I want to bring some of that to my players...but I don't know how necessarily. How do people here build settings that want to maximize despair and horror?

Horror is by far the hardest IMHO genre to DM and DM well. In my circle I'm known for being particularly good at horror and honestly I don't think its something that can be distilled into a formula. In real life what separates horror stories from regular stories is that they sit on the border between fiction and not fiction in a sort of grey area of "maybe?"

Horror requires a massive uptick in theatrics and mood work by the DM because Horror is an emotion that is hard to instill IMO. I tend to depend on a few important factors.

1. The area of the horror is slightly familiar to the PLAYERS in that its somewhere like a village, or a forest, a hotel, a keep, a resort? Usually places that on their surface shouldn't be dangerous but suddenly are.
2. Mood and Atmosphere. Above all else horror campaigns NEED a soundtrack. And I mean, NEED IT!.
3. Isolation: While horror can happen anywhere it is somewhat helpful that the horror attacking be somewhat isolated. Help is far away, or impossible for some reason. Either nobody believes them, they haven't the time to fetch help or they are geographically isolated.
4. Somethings can't be combated with swords/guns/ ect. In some cases there needs to be situations that cannot be fought with brute strength. Dare I say it the majority of them.
5. Pause breaks, It can't be all gore and nightmares, think of the shining. Every single day in that hotel wasn't a constant spiraling madhouse of crazy ****. Just a few needles as reality fell apart.

Note for Despair though, I'm at a bit of a loss. Most campaigns that really tried to have that "OMG we are so ****ed," or "There's no way out," usually become "A million is just a statistic." Its hard to have a big bad ultra death villain OR some sort of world ending doom that either seems too big for the players or quickly loses itself from the horror aesthetic.

Finally horror requires a degree of subtlety, A big degree of it, like a boat load of it. Horror can't be non-stop, endless or a lot. Pick a kind of horror and stick to it and try not to mix and match too much, If its a vampire, stick with vampires.

I had one friend who wanted to create a "Scary town with bad stuff!" type quest, similar to one of mine he played in. He overdid it. There was so much going on and we had so little options that it felt forced, overdone, and lost its appeal. It had ghosts, creepy Innsmouth towns people, magic causing madness and self mutilations, horrible dreams were we all killed eachother, a demon, a Daemon, a Devil, A corrupted insane Angel, 3 vampires and a werewolf for a mayor. And we wont even talk about the zombies surrounding our farmhouse.

YES I am dead serious, the town had all of that. He wanted it to be horror, it wasn't.

[IZ42]

What's a Roche World? Your vague comments indicate something like a binary planet in a shared ball of gas. That would be impossible since the two planets could not hold on to such a huge atmosphere. Look how tiny the atmospheres of Earth and Venus are and Mars couldn't really hold on to anything. The closest thing I could think of would be to drop two tiny planets into a gas giant, but then air drag would slow them down and cause them to crush together into a single body.
If you want an impossible planet in a fantasy world but still want to keep it somewhat plausible, the only working solution is usually to put it into some kind of magical dimension.

How fast new subspieces evolve depends entirely on what kind of selection pressure you have. I think for domestic animals you can get pretty significant differences in just 10 generations or even less. Though in that case you have an extremely storng and very directed selection pressure (the breeder), while at the same time having the individuals that are allowed to breed very well fed and cared for. Animal breeding removes the vast majority of possible genetic combinations that would be perfectly able to survive in a natural environment.
However, it still stands that there is no standard rate of evolution. Sharks looked just like sharks when the dinosaurs were still around and barely changed at all. Yet you can change the color of an entire population of moths in just a single decade. Unless you do selective breeding, the number of factors and variables is incredibly huge. Sometimes you get tiny changes over huge amounts of times, at other times very radical changes very quickly.

A Roche world is like a binary star system, but with planets. The atmospheres are mostly separate, but occasionally the outer layers will touch. Look up the story Rocheworld (with or without the space) to get a better understanding.

I was figuring adapting to distinct environments, gravitational pulls, and other such as the primary driving force behind the separation of humanity into sub-species. For instance, Dwarves adapted to a larger rocky world with a thinner atmosphere, so the higher gravity and harsher conditions made them tough and stocky. Meanwhile the thick atmosphere, extremely dangerous and slightly smaller planet made orcs into a tough and slightly shorter lived race conditioned to lower light, and harsh environments and the pressure from the atmosphere made up for the slightly weaker gravity, making them strong.

Maybe estimate it at 1000-ish years?

[Mechalich]

Sharks looked just like sharks when the dinosaurs were still around and barely changed at all.

Minor aside: this is not actually true despite being widely proclaimed. The seas of the Mesozoic were dominated by Hybodont sharks, a lineage of elasmobranchs actually quite different from, and not directly related to, modern neoselachians.

Sorry, pet peeve of a guy who has spent way to much time deep-diving the history of Chondrichthyes.

[Yora]

I was refering to the late Creataceous, when dinosaurs were just barely around. Though that phrasing could also include the early Triasic, which is more than three times as far back; indeed a bit unclear.