Unnamed Fantasy Setting – Page 2 – The Fire Thieves Studio

The Making of a New World: Arranging the Puzzle

16Nov

By CharlesNo Comments

Environment, Original Worlds, Species/Race, Unnamed Fantasy Setting, Worldbuilding Process

The Making of a New World: Arranging the Puzzle

Last week I began development of an original fantasy world. We discussed the genre and subgenre, the general aesthetic, and the tone of the world, and gave it the temporary code-name FERGUS. This week, it's time to discuss filling out the world with some detail, and determining how to bring a collection of disparate ideas into alignment. The goal is to arrange all these bits and then fill in the gaps, until we have a complete, intricate, and even elegant world. By bits I mean things like races I want to see, monsters that would be cool, settings and locations, plot devices, cultural elements... just anything I might want to put into a story set on this world. And yes, I'm going to stick with this metaphor of putting together a puzzle. 1: Dump Out the Box This part is just ...

The Making of a New World: Genre, Aesthetic, & Tone

Picture a blank piece of paper in front of you; the first page of a thick pad. There is a sharp pencil in your hand with a pristine eraser. These are the first tools of worldbuilding. Thus far I've discussed many techniques and strategies for developing a unique and original world, including what kinds of details are needed to help devise cultures, non-human races, religions, climate, map-making, and other aspects. So now it's time to actually go ahead and put these practices into action. Hopefully I'll be able to get some input from you, my readers, as well, though as the blog is still new I might have to reach out on facebook to get that feedback. So where do we begin? Oftentimes, you may begin with the idea you want to work with andbuild out from that concept, rather than ap...

How to Generate a Map for your World

The Goal So there are any number of ways to draw up a map of the local region, or even a continent. You can start from many different angles, such as putting the city which is the main focus of the story at the center and then just building around it. You could roll randomly for where the deserts and forests and mountains are, or decide arbitrarily as the story dictates. Consistency is pretty important, but in a lot of stories, your players will meet you half way (remember that one?), and you don't need to be perfectly geographically accurate I mean... not unless you want to. Me? I want to. At the very least I want things to make SOME logical sense. There are a few rules for map-making you can keep in mind which will help tie things together, and help it look like a real living locat...