wondrousworldbuilding

[wondrousworldbuilding]

I'm currently trying to world build a magical school for my fantasy realm. I'm having a hard time finding sources online. Any general advice for fantasy schools?

For starters, you want to have your magic system fleshed out really thoroughly. What good is teaching a bunch of kids how to use a magic system that you, the author, don't really know how it works, right!? If you haven't done this, you might check out my Brainstorming posts Here (Part 1) and Here (Part 2) to get started.

Beyond that, you need to think about some school basics:

Are all children educated in magic? Or only the most talented, the richest, or the poorest?

How does society at large feel about magic education and how does that impact the freedom and funds of the school?

(Related:) What kind of teachers are employed at the school? The best and brightest or the shlufs who couldn't make it in a "real" school? How does that affect the education of the students?

How does general education play into the lives of the students? Do they go to primary school first where they learn to read and write etc. or is that part of the their magic school curriculum?

How much danger is there in the day-to-day of the school? Is the magic difficult to use and therefore generally not a risk? Is it ubiquitous and therefore maintains some inherent balance? Is it difficult to use and therefore volatile and unpredictable?

What is the purpose of receiving a magic education and what do its students aspire to do after completing school?

I hope these help you out little bit. :)

Happy building!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

Hi! ^^ I dunno if you are still active but I was wondering how world building should work for a fictional kingdom? Is there anything key to keep in mind while writing it, like environment and or culture? Sorry if I'm not that good at explaining what I mean ^^"

It kind of depends on how similar to real-world monarchies you want your fictional one to be. If you are wanting to build monarchy similar to those we have, then some proper research is going to be your friend. You're going to want to figure out what type of monarchy your world will have. Most "fantasy" monarchies are hereditary, absolute monarchies. But you could also have an elective monarchy, where the people or at least a sect of people elect the King/Queen/Pharaoh/etc. Modern day UK is a Constitutional monarchy, where the monarch is more of a figurehead than a ruling leader.

Narrow down what type of monarchy you're building and go from there in your research.

If you haven't already, check out my collection of Brainstorming Posts to help you think about things like government structure, culture, etc.

Happy building!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

Any tips for making theocracies?

You will need to have a fully fleshed out religion and it wouldn't hurt to have (at least in your own mind) the reason why an entire society of people are willing to follow a deity as their government head. Is it because human extremists have diluted them into following a deity or is it because the god itself is present and either gains loyalty by being a good leader or by being domineering.

These brainstorming posts might also help you, if you haven't looked at them already: Government and Religion

Happy building!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

Is it logical for a patrarchal society to expect women to be cold, agressive, hostile and completely asocial? Let's say that they don't consider a woman with an active social life to be unfeminine, but would view her as "sexually degrading herself and the public space". What should be the logical punishment for this, in such a setting?

I don't see anything illogical about this situation necessarily, but I do suggest that you be really careful in the way your narrative handles and comments on this situation. You can totally develop a society where the sexual view of a gender is skewed and very different from our own, but if your narrative appears to be saying things should be this way or that way, you could be angering or isolating readers.

For example: you can have a racist or sexist protagonist without the narrative itself being racist or sexist. Does the story condone the bad situation or behavior?

As far as a logical punishment, I don't know exactly what that would be; you haven't given enough information. It would entirely depend on what the general social consensus is on the severity of the "crime" if a woman being social could be considered a crime, which would be strange.

But once again, it all depends on what commentary your narrative is making about this set up. I just warn you to be sensitive and careful.

Happy (and careful) building!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

Hello, first of all I have to tell you that your advice on world construction has helped me a lot for my writing, so thank you very much. Now you would be asking me if you could give me permission to translate your stories into Spanish, of course with the respective credits. Thank you for your time and I hope I can continue enjoying your work.

I'm aware this ask is probably pretty old and I'm sorry!

By story, do you mean my posts? If so, absolutely! I'd like to help as many people as possible. I so much appreciate you asking.

[wondrousworldbuilding]

I don't spend much time in the online worldbuilding community, but I've been working on a project for a while. Is there anyone in the community that's good with biology and math and willing to help me out? My world isn't entirely original; it's based on a planet from a comic book that was fed to a space god and is hardly ever mentioned, so I figure it's fair game. But I'm working with data from the source, which makes the math hard (because they were clearly not picked with the science in mind). I'm trying to apply the square cube law to humanoid alien biology, with aliens that are larger than most humans (in the realm of humans with gigantism) which is hard to find data on. And I'm an engineer (student), not a biologist. Basically I'm trying to retrofit science to an artistic creation. I'm not going to have space to go into detail here, even without all the preamble, so ideally it would be helping over the messaging system. (And I'm very tired and my brain doesn't want to Do Words right now but I want to ask while I still remember) and I'm trying to avoid Reddit. Sorry for the ramble. It's not so much asking for advice and more asking if you or your followers are willing to help me.

I'm aware that this ask is probably pretty old, and I'm sorry about that. I get to asks as I can and life has been crazy for me....but if this is still something you're struggling with, then perhaps someone out there can help you.

I'm not sure I'm going to be much help as I'm not a biology expert at all, either. I got a degree in *writing* so..... *shrug*

I can say that sometimes the science doesn't have to be exact and as long as you deal with it properly in your narrative, your readers are not going to mind. Readers can suspend their disbelief a really long way if it's needed and warrented.

I mean, Terry Pratchett built a world that people loved and it was flat, held up by a team of giant elephants, balanced on the back of a gigantic sea/space turtle.....

Happy buiding!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

My ask box is totally caught up, all questions answered and queued. I’m around accepting asks!! If you have any worldbuilding writing questions, send them in! I’m dying to help you out. 

If you’ve submitted a question in the past and it isn’t answered in the next few hours, then resubmit and I’ll be happy to answer. 

[wondrousworldbuilding]

Discussion! Or ignorant question - I just recently ran across the “36 Dramatic Situations for Stories” or “There are only 7 Basic Plots”. How does this affect world building? The basic premise is that there are only so many ideas that make a story and nowadays it’s all a repeat cycle of stories refurbished or rebranded. Is there any truth to these two views?

A wise person once said: There's some truth in every point of view.

Yeah, I'm just kidding, I made that up. But it sounds like it's probably true.

If you Google "basic plots" then you'll come across a half million articles all giving you a number (and they won't all be the same) about how there are only x number of plots and all fiction is recycled.

I mean, I guess. But why does it matter?

If you take five writers--all of relatively equal talent--and sit them down at a table and say, "Write a 5000 word story about an anti-hero protagonist and their bff getting into a scrape and using morally-gray, ethically questionable means to get out of it. They must all conclude the story at their sweet grandmother's house for cookies."

That's a fairly specific set of circumstances and character types. But those five talented writers will write five incredibly different and probably somewhat equally enjoyable stories. In fact, you could tell a hundred different writers to do the same thing and not a single one of those stories will be alike.

So when you're talking about broad-strokes plot elements....yeah, there are only so many conventions and tropes that storytelling can use and writers *use the shit out of them*. You know why?

Because they freakin' work. People LIKE stories elements that they're familiar with. Even writers who do the unexpected are working within conventional storytelling tropes. A writer who turns a trope on its head still is expected to tell a satisfyingly story.

Writers who disregard the art of using plot and story tropes wisely are writers who will likely not tell a story that anyone wants to read. It will not be satisfying. It will be nonsensical.

When you ignore or destroy tropes, you need to do it *knowingly* and *with purpose*.

The originality comes in the details...and worldbuilding is one of those details that still has a universe of untapped originality.

Create your unique and inspired world and set a "well-worn" plot within it and you've created something new.

Now go write!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

[wondrousworldbuilding]

I will continue to build upon this list as time goes on. For now, I hope you find something useful!

Worldbuilding Prompt of the Day Tag

Brainstorming Series Posts

Magic Systems, Part One

Magic Systems, Part Two 

New Species

New Worlds 

New Cultures 

New Civilizations

Politics and Government 

Map Making 

Belief Systems & Religion

Guilds, Factions, Groups

War & Conflict

Science & Technology

Wildlife & Ecosystems

History & Lore

Species/Races

Creating long-lived species

Evolution of sexual reproduction in fictional species

Writing in a world without humans

Sounds non-sapient species can produce

Developing Fantastic Races (Link)

Creating Realistic Aliens and Their Worlds (Link)

Language

Languaging

Handling “Foreign” Language Within the Narrative

Developing Ancient Languages

Google Ngrams: tool for researching period-appropriate language

Astronomy/Planetary Physics

Multiple Moons Effect on Planet

Controlling the Biomes on your World (with Science!)

Controlling the Gravity on your World (also with Science!)

Giving Your World Fantastic Skies (Link)

Why Tatooine is Plausible: Orbitary Mechanics of Binary Star Systems (Link)

What if Earth Had Two Moons?

Geology/Land

Map Making Photoshop Brush Set

How to develop a country when you don’t know where to start

Useful Geography Descriptors 

Creating a World with Realistic Terrain

Forest types (aesthetic)

Laying out Villages and Towns

Specific Settings

Differentiating between Ancient Times and Medieval Times

Tips and Ideas for Writing Post-Apocalypse

Worldbuilding when there’s no “world” present

General Worldbuilding

Words for sections within a city

Using Characters as Worldbuilding Tools

Creating Unique Cultures

Prioritizing Worldbuilding Details In the Narrative

Filling in the Details

Weaving in the Details (Link)

Creating Realistic Cultures (Link)

Being a God of Your Own World (Link)

How to Create a Fantasy World (Link)

Creating Fictional Currency 

Writing Prophecies Without Making Eyes Roll

Logistics of Mega-Cities in Fantasy

So You Have Too Much Worldbuilding Exposition…

Worldbuilding/Writing Quotes Tag

Random

My personal writing playlist

Writing Pregnancy, Labor, and Birth (Link)

Using Indexes and Guides in your Novel

Writing in Multiple Points of View

How to Edit Your Own Writing (Link)

The Ultimate Guide to Worldbuilding (Link)

Avoiding Deus Ex Machina

Helpful Generators 

Vulgar - Conlang generator

City Generator

Seventh Sanctum - expansive SpecFic generator

Deity Generator

Guild/Clan name generator

Planet name generator

Random map generator

More personalized map generator

Prophecy Generator 

Technobabble Generator

SciFi Corporation Generator

Fantasy Calendar Generator (Multiple Moons, etc)

[wondrousworldbuilding]

[wondrousworldbuilding]

any ideas on how pronouns would work in a world without gender/sex? im trying to figure something out that wouldn't confuse both me and the readers.

some things i've thought about, but still iffy on:

(prns = pronouns)

using they/them for everyone: nice gender-neutral prns, but might get pretty confusing if everyone is addressed by "they/them"

making up prns and separating them by "classes" (e.g. animate things, inanimate things, etc.): afraid people won't understand/be confused by the new prns and/or how they're used

using honorific/status prefixes/suffixes (e.g. japanese honorifics): i don't really want to use something that's status based

i currently think that the making prns up one is the best choice so far, but i'm not sure what types of "classes/sub-groups" to separate them into (since i don't want everyone going by the same prns, too confusing), so any ideas are appreciated!

I would agree that making up pronouns or using non-standard pronouns is likely your best bet. At the very least having a different plural and singular pronoun. I have a world with three distinct genders as use xe/xer as the third gender pronouns. In Octavia Butler’s book Lilith’s Brood, she makes up a word for her third gender--ooloi (though she uses they/them for their pronouns). 

We already use different pronouns for animate and inanimate objects, so that’s a got precedent and would make perfect sense. Honorifics don’t have to be status based, they could easily be relationship based, i.e. someone you are close to, someone you’re acquainted with, and someone you don’t know all use different honorifics (similar to Japanese, but maybe without the “amount of respect you have for said person” factor). Then it would vary from person to person and could not so easily affect how others view them. If you assign honorifics to something static like profession or or family ties, you will likely end up with some amount of classist bias that develops organically within the culture.

Regardless of what you decide, I agree that you need to have some system established. Using they/them for everyone would be confusing. I have one non-binary character in a book that goes by they/them pronouns and it occasionally can be confusing if I’m talking about a just them or a group performing an action. It usually requires some attentive wording. 

Hopefully that helps you.

Happy writing!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

[wondrousworldbuilding]

Semi-related to my previous ask, I'm not finding good Alternate Earth worldbuilding resources, do you have any? Specifically cultures, maybe dealing with speculation? I went looking through your master list and didn't see what I was looking for. If my possible extinction event happened 10,000 years ago, I'm thinking cultures evolved differently, since it created new/hybrid creatures that would have intermingled to some extent, but then again, maybe the real people would be considered legends anyway, (hiding in plain sight) and it wouldn't change local cultures.

I’m not sure about resources for the thing you are looking for. I do, however, suggest reading Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. (Refer HERE to my review of the book.) Over the course of the novel, a thing very similar to what you’re describing happens (5000 years have passed since the apocalypse in this world). It is not a fun read, but it is incredibly interesting and education. I recommend it for all worldbuilders who want to dig in and improve their craft and expand their mind! 

I would also recommend a general study of anthropology. There are several well-reviewed introduction to anthropology books on Amazon and used on Thrift Books and Abe Books. I’ve not read any, but after writing this answer I genuinely might. The study of how cultures form and evolve is not only interesting--and would help you on your project--but would be beneficial to any secondary world speculative fiction writers!

Happy building!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

Do you have any tips on how to build a world for superheroes?

Building a world for superheroes is just like building any other world with a magic system. Superpowers are just magic. 

I will reference you to my Magic Systems posts Part One and Part Two. And remind you of Brandon Sanderson’s Second Law of Magic: the most interesting part of a magic system is not what it CAN do, but what it CAN’T. 

Happy building!

[wondrousworldbuilding]

I need to create a poem about languages specifically math language. Any tips or how to create a lovely poem, without your readers noticing that I hate math? Math Language X Poem

The rules for creating poetry are going to be true no matter what language you are writing in. Now...as far as math-inspired poetry specifically I fear I am not going to be the best at that because math. Not my thang. 

However, poetry.

I am definitely a prose writer, but have needed to write poetry occasionally for pieces of my fiction, for assignments, and for workshops. There are a few tips for beginners who are attempting their hand at poetry I can give you.

Read poetry - As in, before you sit down to write your poem, get into the right headspace. If you are planning to write poetry regularly, then of course reading poetry often should be a habit. However, for your purposes of writing it for your work of fiction, you simply need to get your head into the right place. You can also listen to poetry being read to achieve the same effect. Or read it aloud yourself and listen to the art of the language. Mmmm. (You should also just read poetry recreationally from time to time because language is beautiful.)

Utilize available tools - Use a thesaurus or rhyming dictionary to find the perfect word. Use a metronome to help visualize rhythm (there are apps for this). 

Study your poetic literary devices - There is more than just rhythm and rhyming to poetry. Do yourself a favor and listen to Amanda Gorman reading her poem at Biden’s inauguration. Listen to her alliterations and assonance. Incredible. Know your language tools and utilize them to their greatest power. 

Don’t put too much pressure on yourself - Just like your prose, your poetry can and will go through some drafts and edits. Get words down, let them breathe, and then come back to them later and see if you can make them even better. Keep doing that. That’s writing.

Happy building!

[wondrousworldbuilding]