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There's The Songsparrow. Who is basically a modern day popstar who sings ballads for noble courts and peasant alike and dodges angry husbands.

One of the world-shaping events of my setting is an incredibly advanced pre-human civilization creating a machine that had to destroy all their enemies, on a metaphysical level.
This led to a last-ditch attack before it could be completed. In current version, the attack is performed by combined might of Angels and Demons, despite the whole setting revolving around the clash of Light and Dark.
I can't put a finger on it - would presenting a threat that made Angels and Demons work together, even if briefly, actually make for a cool moment in lore, or it would undermine the central conflict?

>>96743297
I have a setting with periodic cataclysms on a smaller time scale (basically the same as what you suggested initially, like a thousand years or less) so I can say what I've done at least.
I think it's a good way to make a setting dynamic and interesting.
>It feels stupid to fit multiple such cataclysms into a timeline measured in thousands of years. If a cataclysms destroys everything...
It doesn't have to destroy everything. Mine are usually strong enough to basically reset civilization back to a baseline, but it doesn't erase all the knowledge hoarded before the apocalypse. If any pockets survive, they pretty rapidly are able to resettle and it can mean a civilization/society in a bad spot at the end of an era that manages to survive all of a sudden ends up in a dominant position. Seers and prophets can also potentially foresee the disaster and prepare for it, making the position even more secure.
>why care about the struggle of good and evil if the slate will be wiped clean
The obvious answer would be to make the 'evil' responsible for the cataclysms, but either way focus on the continuity between eras too
>Not to mention forests and animal populations which just wouldn't have time to spread again.
Unless you're talking about something on the order of the dinosaur-killing asteroid, you'd be surprised. Some study said that life had returned to the literal Chicxulub crater within three years after impact. And that was just on an entirely different scale in terms of how destructive the event was. Treat the first couple hundreds years after the Cataclysm as a "recovery" phase, like forests are growing back, new animals are recolonizing the lands. It can be an interesting period to play around with as well for a setting.
>Plus for long-lived races, such as Dwarves and Elves, this would be stupid.
I personally cut the lifespans of my dwarves and elves, but I think playing with the idea of the "proud race perseveres through the cataclysm" is cool too.

>>96745477
Also to extend my reply a bit, I feel like fantasy doesn't really treat a thousand years as the massive amount of time it really is.
1000 BC was just after the bronze age collapse - a thousand years later Augustus was ruling the Roman Empire. A thousand years after that and William the Conqueror was invading England at the dawn of the High Middle Ages.
A thousand years ago for a premodern society is basically into the realm of legend or myth already.
A cataclysm every thousand years? Well shit, that means there would have only been 4 cataclysms since the Pyramids of Giza were built - which are constructs so ancient even the Ancient Greeks considered them to be basically straight out of the age of myth.

Is this the thread to discuss VTTs and map-making tools? I'm looking at RPTools' MapTool, free and open-source, not sure if anyone got any feedback. I want to playtest an rpg with my cousin and we live in 2 different cities so need VTT until we meet up again. Needs to support hex grids cause muh GURPS.

>>96745477
>>96745534
Those are fair points. Thank you. I think I'll compress the timeline to a more manageable level. 100k years since creation of the world, with most humanoids emerging just 10k years ago

Hi guys, I very infrequently visit /tg/ (like once or twice a year, if that)

Anyways, I want to make a game that's basically a dungeon crawler, that scales into party management and has 4X elements, with simulated economies and factions and stuff. I've been using ChatGPT to roughly hash out and refine ideas, since I can basically throw shit at it and it'll group things together and narrow down how I *actually* want to approach things. Anyone else doing that sort of thing?

Since I wanted to have a focus on deep finance (contracts, derivatives and the like), I figured the easiest way to have it mirror modern conventions was to just use magic... but if magic was so widespread, it would create other issues. So then my thought was to have some kind of extraplanar being manage stuff, so I ended up going with Djinn - they don't care about mortal politics, are very contract/oath oriented, powerful magicians, and being nonpartisan allows them to just build wealth up (as opposed to say, vampire lords or dragons or demons, though they might participate to an extent).

The other hurdle I need to clear conceptually is how to justify dungeons popping up everywhere and why collecting millions of gp in loot won't distort the economy. My thought here was that depending on local conditions (stability, religion, wealth) would affect the kind of dungeons that would appear, such as bandit dens appearing near borders with low stability, that sort of thing. And lairs would probably just have a ton of mundane crap in them (a few coins, art objects, weapons) and the wealth would come from fulfilling contracts or developing the player's own faction economy.

For magic, I'm leaning towards D&D sort of logic for now, having a discipline (transmutation) and a catalyst (divine, arcane) as a placeholder, until I get more of the fundamentals figured out. It's something I've just been sketching out on and off for a few years, but this is the first time I've really posted about it anywhere

>>96748753
Maybe dungeons are so dangerous you pretty much need magic to have a hope of clearing them.
But afterwards the Djinn take nine-tenths of the treasure as their "share" as part of the compact for lending their magic out.
Who made the dungeons? Clearly a magical precursor race, maybe one that used to fight the Djinn over control of magic and got wiped out - which is another motivation for the Djinn to be using mortals to get "their" treasures back.

>>96748753
I despise AI for the usual reasons people will repeat but since I'm a hypocrite sometimes I'll use it to work with stuff I'm unfamiliar with.
But I really do caution you - most recently I was trying to use it to work out the astrophysics of my setting and it got some very basic shit wrong that even I caught on to.
As an example I asked it how long it would take for my moon to rise and set. It responded based on the orbital period of the moon and didn't take into account the planet's rotation. Under its logic it would take a month for our own moon to rise and set.
So if I can't trust it with basic level shit then why should I trust it with anything that needs tons of math and equations I don't even understand myself?

Okay, the timeline got compressed to 50 thousand years since the world took on a stable form. That's a big improvement from my original plan that made it 1 million years long.
The world was creates a while before that, but the concept of time wasn't really around, and it was just chaos with Archangels and First Demons clashing over churning elements for what mortals would have perceived as many millenia.
Crap like Deep Ones and Serpent-Men dominate world for a several tens of thousands of years, while animals evolve, ecosystems settle, etc before proper humanoids come around, which happens around 10 thousand years ago.
So the whole history, with 3 precursor races fills 10 thousand years and at least 4 world-changing cataclysms.
I can work with that.

Angels were the first mortal race made by the Allfather, forged out of silver and pearls, and granted life and flesh. They were winged, long-lived, and so beautiful, than when the Fey entered the world, they were enthralled and took on shapes like those of angels, which is why Elves are so beautiful.
Most of them died when the Enemy sent the Blood Curse and the angels wiped themselves out in a frenzy of blood, aside from a handful, saved by Allfather to become his heralds. Since that day, silver tarnishes, when before it was as untouchable as gold.
Some say the Men of Gold were created by the Enemy, and their many atrocities lend credibility to that idea. They were forged of gold and amber.
Giants were made by the world itself, some say, or maybe by Allfather, explaining their affinity for lightning, and they were forged of thunderbolt iron and diamond. The Giants in turn forged Dwarves to aid them. Dwarves were forged from iron and rock, making them hardy and tough, but forever seeking the splendour of Giants in precious metals and gemstones.
Humans were not forged per se, but olden myths ascribe them bronze and garnet, for their early weapon were of bronze, and garnets are the color of blood they shed.

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>I have this goddess of moon and night, called Luna, and I want to give her a sister
>what should I call her?
>hmmm
>uhhh
>ahhh
>ah yes, "Noctis"
>yeah, I still got it

>>96752083
Yes, classics are classic for a reason.
That is indeed a perfect name for a moon goddess.

Hm, if gunpowder is a low-grade demonic substance in the setting, what's stopping demons from rocking tons of firearms?

>>96743359
Kys d*scord cancer.

>>96749066
One idea I kinda like is that the plane is effectively a storage closet/ant farm owned by a djinn prince. All the people, objects, and wealth that exist (processed or not) belong to him and he can come collect (or make his lesser djinn servants collect it) at any time. But the scale is so grand that it basically is just a rumor that pops up every couple of centuries and nobody really notices or cares

>>96749468
I find it's very poor at doing calculations or math, but it's good as a way to consolidate ideas or find some concepts you wouldn't necessarily think of yourself. Or to summarize something and ask questions about it in a natural way, whereas something like wikipedia is just a word dump. You can also cheat the prompts sometimes, eg telling it to explain it to a child vs 160 iq, very different results

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Wyrmsong is more about "culturebuilding" than "worldbuilding". WE, the individuals gathered here, are the speakers, not a fictional race (though we can and shall borrow symbolism from fiction and mythology).

>>96755243
This guy started a new thread before the last one ended just to try to satisfy you, subhuman. 5 next time.

>>96748753
>dungeon crawler, that scales into party management and has 4X elements, with simulated economies and factions
That's some good shit. There is an early access game called Dungeon Settlers doing a similar thing but without the 4X and simulated economy stuff afaik. There's a book called orconomics which goes into the economics and funding of dungeon delving which are treated like an invesment but it's only a backdrop for the mediocre story. Tvtropes has pages on the dungeon economy trope here https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DungeonBasedEconomy you can steal ideas from, it has a page for the book too.

>>96755367
You should go back to whatever shit hole you came from instead of shitting up the thread with your child grooming site spam.

>>96755386
>accuses others of spam
>has been spamming the thread for four years
I've been here longer than you, faggot. Get out.

>>96755386
He's just a cheap troll, ignore him, don't give him attention.

Why is this thread so dead? Its used to be so active...
Is it because of LLMs?

Me deciding that wizards create a magical territory whenever they flex their powers, which is why the massive explosions they create don't have much collateral damage.

I think it's also going to be useful to explain why the known laws of physics don't just shatter when magic is used. Technically speaking, the Wizards are fighting in a whole different universe.

>>96757153
I've already got lore about Wizards having a passive field around themselves that shields them from temporal changes. If someone goes back in time and changes the timeline, or just changes the world as it is, wizards will stay unaffected and remember the old timeline.

You could say that their data isn't stored on the same server as the rest of us.

Incidentally, this also means that Prediction doesn't work on them.

>>96757109
This whole board is dead. Wannabe jannies and /pol/tards drove off anybody who wanted to hang out and have fun.

>>96757161
What do you mean stay unaffected?
A wizard walks into a bar.
I travel back in time, buy the bar, demolish the bar, and make a pit filled with spikes in there.
Does the wizard in the present suddenly find himself in a pit of spikes?

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What is the most common government system in your world?

>>96758395
Monarchy, obviously. A few tetrachies, of sorts.
Some occasional comic relief or tragically naive places are legitimate democracies, but mostly if its ruled by a council or the people, its actually just a front for a dictatorship.

>>96758395
bronze age god-king monarchies, city states run by tyrant princes, theocratic councils of oracles, seers, and priests usually have a major role with some states being outright run by them entirely and also one apocalyptic death cult that simp for some alien genocidal maniacs
the other major form of government is basically tribal confederacies that are usually no better than petty clan warlordism

I finally did it.
I finally devised a reasoning why firearms are scarce and not proliferating in my setting, despite their power, and balanced them in the grand scheme of things while keeping their individual power intact.
I deserve a cookie.

What image generation do you guys use to get illustrations for your characters, gods etc? Whats the best to use?

>>96760782
There is a /slop/ thread here on this board, ask your degenerate question there

>>96760811
Okay, whats degenerate about it though?

>>96755113
Maybe it's hard to make gunpowder in hell, since it would detonate instantly from the heat.

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Which board would be the best for gathering collaborators for an invented language?

>>96758395
Feudalism. It re-emerged in the far future mainly because space is big and hard to govern, and most people don't actually want to be politically active when their basic needs are fully covered by automation. The nobility class doesn't actively discriminate and there is technically social mobility but it's a rounding error and they have been refining themselves genetically and socially for decades so there's a pretty big gap. It's intended to be kinda depressing but kinda hopeful, like in the sense that the majority will amuse themselves in a haze of contentment all their lives but at least they are content.

Are your worlds villains more over-the-top dark lord Sauron types or more like Cardinal Richelieu realistic human evil types?

What are the political ideologies of the different factions in your setting?

>>96743359
I have more than just nobles and warriors. I have artists, crafters, teachers, and healers that are well known.

>come up with distinct visual feature for the setting
>need lore to explain it, but can't write satisfying one
>write lore to explain why it is needed
>write lore about places where feature is not present to juxtapose
>develop the connections
>fill out gaps
>due to writing around visual feature, it now seems blatantly out of place
>throw it out
>get decent setting that is visually bland
>still want to use visual feature
God dammit

>>96764208
>Richelieu
>villain
Are you 12?

>the top god of the setting is a deity of light
>worshipped in three manifestations - the Sun, the lightning bolt, and candlelight.
>feel content until I realize that the trinity can be summed up as the Lightning, the Sun and the Holy Fire, and it sounds like a bad punny pastiche of christianity
>English has no synonyms for the Sun
Fuck. What do?

>>96765317
Shift it around a bit so that the manifestations align with more meaningful day-to-day symbols/phenomena, maybe even divide the God into three faces or aspects.
Replace the Sun with the Dawn
>Represents the victory of light over darkness and the eternal nature of the Father of Light, who returns every day to bask his Children in holy light
Replace the Lightning Bolt with the Storm
>Even though Storms bring darkness to the sky, they themselves are full of light - for the Father's divine judgement is indeed fearsome. By bearing witness to this power the Children understand the depths of our Father's might - and through ritual and libations we pray keep his fury at bay.
Replace the Candlelight with the Hearth
>Do not presume that the fires of men are our own creation; we owe everything to the Father of Light. Though his grace, we are given the gift of Light and warmth unto ourselves.
Or something like that, this is just what came to my mind.

>>96757752
Yes, exactly. That is, unless his own future sight didn't tip him off beforehand.

Any battles between time controllers becomes really confusing to talk about because both are changing reality by forestalling each other's moves. It only makes sense if you assume different timelines.

>>96766241
Let's say a wizard lives in a tower, upper floor. He sleeps there every night. Let's say for simplicity he teleports there.
One night I travel back in time before the wizard move in and demolish the tower.
Will he fall to his death in the present I traveled from, or he will do so when he first time teleported into the non-existent top floor?

I always run into problem of "what they do day in and day out" especially for warrior and long-lived races. Let alone long-lived warrior races.
Take Giants, for instance. They are these mighty sages, who created Dwarfs in ages past. They don't farm, don't hunt, don't really build anymore (Dwarfs serve their needs, basically). They ponder the orb, guide the dwarfs (but not rule) and fight great evils. But that leaves them with zero hobbies or activities. They don't even have to train, due to their nature.

And then there are Sky Giants, who don't even eat, and don't hang out around Dwarves most of the time.

Of course I could just leave their activities a mystery, but I want to know for myself!

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>>96743359
>Tell us about any great painters / composers / writers in your setting. Do you have descriptions of their great works? Or even, for madlads, examples?
While I have done some pictures of in-universe artwork for my SF setting, that's really been the case of me being lazy and excusing a more stylized picture as the result of the art style used. I've only actually named one famous artist, singer and songwriter John "Junior" Vainio Jr., who wrote some of the best-known spacer songs. But that's really just my tribute to Heinlein's Rhysling and a famous songwriter from my father's hometown. Aside from naming some of his songs ("The Smuggler's Lament", "My Friend, the Old Spacer", "Sons of the Eagle"), I don't actually have any examples of what he's supposed to have written.
I did, however write a military march/national anthem to one of my alien civilizations. Granted, that's another dumb in-joke where I took a famous military march from my native country, altered some words, and translated the result to English. Not exactly high-effort work, though I did at least ensure that the original (non-English) version fits the original meter and mostly rhymes as it should. I did a similar thing for a short clip of what was supposed to be a longer song, but that was just a part of a Kipling poem with words altered and removed from the original context.

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>>96743359
What ways are potential heirs to the throne tested in your settings? I’m looking for ideas for that myself and I’ve hit a block.

>>96766696
>warrior races
Competitive sports. Some of these likely have a martial flavor to them (wrestling, javelin throwing, fencing, horsemanship, archery, the kind of stuff that went on in medieval tournaments, etc), or otherwise cultivate skills and mentalities beneficial to a warrior.
Sports are valued as an opportunity to prove themselves in peacetime, for lack of any battles to be fighting, but also just because they love the competition for its own sake.
>long-lived races
If all their other needs are met, then my first suggestion would be dedicating their free time to philosophy (fitting the sage archetype of your giants), and/or the arts. Their race produces many renowned musicians, poets, storytellers, etc, having spent their long lives cultivating their craft; they are sought after as teachers by the shorter-lived races, able to impart lifetimes worth of experience upon them.
Leaning into the (presumed) size of the giants, maybe some carve logs into statues for a hobby, and there's at least a couple of mountains out there that have been sculpted into something by a particularly dedicated giant with a lot of time on their hands.

>>96765317
>the top god of the setting is a deity of light
What are the other gods like? If we know more we can better answer the question.

>>96760819
>whats degenerate about it
Because some "artists" make a living by doing a commission and ai jeopardize their livelihood.
I'd say they deserved to be replaced, if they are good, they wouldn't worry about ai changing them.

>>96769016
Historically through leading armies.

>>96766342
Yes to both. The timelines will merge so that the tower was already demolished before he teleported up there. The Wizard will then teleport to the top and fall....and then just get up and brush the dust off his robes, but still.

He will then know someone went back in time to change reality.

>>96769016
Ottoman style battle royale on ruler death.
Want the throne? Better be ready to murder all your brothers for it.

Its exciting to invent new biomes
>great mountain ranges are 12-15 km tall
>highest known peak is 21 km tall
>mountains are snow-free to about 4 km altitude outside frozen lands (the world is flat so there is no gradient like on Earth)
>snow caps stretch from there to about 10km altitude
>above that snow disappears
>air there is warm-ish (~5-10° C) and thin enough that humans become lightheaded and cannot exert themselves too much, but still breathable; it doesn't get thinner with altitude after that
>sky is deep and very dark blue, almot black
>aside from towering cumulonimbuses rising from lower atmosphere, the only clouds there are thin silvery plumes and wisps, barely visible from the world down below
>despite lack of clouds or precipitation, there are powerful lightning storms, as power flows up the mountains and is discharged into the atmosphere
>due to quirks of atmosphere there, there are rainbows, but they are gold, rimmed with purple and silver; they are invisible from the world below
>there are rare minerals and ores, such as orichalcum, found almost exlusively this high up, due to processes that created these mountains, and the lightning storms
>the only below-world beings that live this up high are geese, mountain goats, eagles, and variety of jumping mice, but there are also entirely local creatures, that I haven't made up yet
>the height of the tallest mountains is about the same as the lowest branches of the World Tree

Now I have to figure out the implications

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>>96772352
Reminder that AI can only replace artists if the AI is trained on their work in the first place, usually without regard to copyright law or permission. Truth is, AI are just plagiarism machines. But non artist people don't care about that unless they're rich corporations who can sue people into the ground for it.

I dislike AI because it looks very obviously generated and bad. And when players bring AI art to my table ("This is what my character looks like!" "I generated the image for the magic item you gave us!") my reaction is "No, nothing in my world looks like THAT"

I think using AI for stuff like character portraits is fine since most people aren't very good at drawing, and you probably aren't going to pay an actual artist just to illustrate your DnD character unless you're really invested in that character.
But as the guy in >>96772776 screencap says, it's basically about getting pictures without having to learn how to draw yourself.

>>96772852
IF your character is SOOOOO unique that out of billions of fantasy artworks created by people there not a SINGLE one that fits your character, sure. Otherwise, please use some google or pinterest or whatever and find a man-made picture. You're a human fighter with a sword and shield, Kevin, I'm sure you can find a picture that fits you.

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>>96759844

>here is your cookie

Please share how you solved the fantasy firearm paradox?

>>96773126
NTA but there was a pretty big period of overlap IRL where people still carried swords for personal defense despite guns being widespread on the battlefield (alongside swords, lances, and in earlier years pikes), because for various reasons the technology/industry/manufacturing of the powder and guns wasn't yet there to make them viable as the all-purpose fightan weapon
exactly how far you can push it is probably going to depend on the kind of scale you want your fights to be, with smaller skirmishes lettting you field more advanced firearms while keeping non-guns viable
17th century-ish, pre-flintlock era is probably the most reliable cutoff point, but depending on what you want in the setting and how you manage implementing them, you might be able to go further: pre-Minié ball might the next point I'd nominate, but the absolute hard limit would have to be pre-smokeless powder

>>96772893
Nobody cares you blue haired faggot. If anything I'm fucking glad your onions ass is being thrown into the trash by "AI".

>>96765317
>English has no synonyms for the Sun
Star?

>>96773126
Truth be told I am >>96755113 , so its a bit easier than in a setting with realistic gunpowder.
But basically, being demonic in nature, and flamepowder corrupts the user over time, especially if you burn it. Nations brash enough to use it utilize special arcane alloys and holy enchantments to make weapons safe(-ish), dwarves use runes. But most consider the drawbacks too great.
Demons avoid firearms because in close proximity to them it becomes incredibly volatile. If a demon grabs a loaded piatol, it will explode in its claw. Very rarely demons do use firearms, but they are even more warded against demon magics than mortals' ones, ironically.

I need inspiration to build the initial story of my group of PCs.
The unmutable premise is:
they are unarmed with street clothes
they have no money
they have skills in different weapons and spells so will try to aquire weapons, armor, magic items
they start in a peaceful town but will embark on a ship to some quest when they are done getting geared

Main question I need inspiration for:
Why are they all together, what were they doing right before that explains why they are broke and why they are already skilled in weapons and have good starting attributes like strength, dexterity, etc

I thought maybe they could have just graduated from the University of Peaceful Invasion Arts and shared a class and became friends, or something.

>>96775157
They all met in a tavern, sitting at a table with complete amnesia

>>96775167
On the table there was a piece of parchment, on which is each of their names, written in their hands, complete with words "I agree to this memory wipe of my own free will" and their signatures - amnesia lets them recognize that much
Next to it lies a flier advertising the ship they get on

I need ideas of names/titles for the Satan figure
Ideally two of them, because what mortals universally perceive as the Devil, what cultists worship, what angels warn prophets about, is merely a herald.
True Satan is an Azathoth-like entity that almost immediately corrupts anyone even aware of it, unless they are blessed by God, usually shattering their mind into vegetative state, and on occassion breaking reality. Even lesser demons aren't safe.

>>96775167
possible but then the whole campaign they will wonder what happened that caused the amnesia and GM will need to come up with story that doesn't suck, which is why this part of the initial story is important

>>96775167
>>96775185
actually genius, thank you, i will put the ship departure 3 days from the tavern meetup so they have time to get geared and learn combat (the combat system and tactics because first time using this rpg system)

>>96743359
"On the Solidarity of Man and the nature of economics and Governance."

A book that created two vastly different counties post a imperial civil war that resulted in two major overseas holdings to break off. The book wasn't meant to be revolutionary or anti imperial but was made as an examination of different economic and government/social styles to help Imperial Scholars navigate different cultures as they planned to assimilate them.

>>96775272
Satan figure
>Shetaan

>>96765317
>>feel content until I realize that the trinity can be summed up as the Lightning, the Sun and the Holy Fire, and it sounds like a bad punny pastiche of christianity

It actually IS anon. You're unoriginal as fuck.

Anyway it's not really a problem to have more than one symbol. Jesus: lamb, shepered, wine. Zeus: eagle, lighting, oak.

The conflict between the two Great Powers of my setting can best be described as Nation vs State in geopolitical terms.

The Union of Tripura is the State. Their idea of world domination involves making a UN with teeth, except with just one hegemon: themselves. It would mean an entire world run by the same laws, the same institutions, and the same groups of officials.

In other words, they are trying to make a World State.

The Ellysan Empire is the Nation. It wants to make a world dominated by Elyssan people. They want everyone to speak their language, worship their god, and carry on their culture.

Their idea of world domination is basically that all states are dominated by Ellyssans, even if they have different rulers and borders.

>>96780043
It's like the 90s neoliberal UN fighting a unified Islamic Jihad.

>>96778814
Its not about three symbols, that part is fine, its about Sun sounding exactly like Son. And there being "Holy something" in the trinity

>>96758395
Sort of blend of caste system and feudalism, as due to genetic engineering and selective breeding, the various noble houses are essentially distinct races from both each other as well as the commoner masses.

>>96775157
Lost a regional fighting tournament in that peaceful town after pawning their shit to get there trying to make a name for themselves/some prize money.

Nothing stops peaceful towns from having fighting tournaments and those turn out all sorts of cocky shlub losers with decent fighting skills.

>>96772776
>literally who tweet
Kazuma kaneko went full into ai and the result was horrendous.
No, ai can't replace real artist.
Only, phony artists worried about ai, because gooners now can just generate their fetishes for free.

>>96780051
That falls squarely into the "you problem" category. Even if other people point out the linguistic similarity, it's not actually a problem.

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>>96759844
>>96773126
>fantasy firearm paradox?
This the first time i heard about this.
What's the problem with firearm in fantasy anyway?

>>96780963
It drives autists mad.

>>96759844
>>96780963
>>96781082

The party goes on a quest to see with their own eyes what that lightning stick of death is all about.
They assemble the best equipment in the lands to best it in case it is turned their way. They want it for themselves ultimately.
The setting potential is strong as long as not every guard in every city has a musket.

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I just found out that furries only attracted to disney-fied animal, so as long the head lf the beastmen are realistic, i can avoid the furry community.
Now, anyone knows how to avoid the animal fuckers community?
I think, as long as below the neck of beastmen is just normal human body, it would be enough to avoid the animal fuckers.

>>96743359
>Tell us about any great painters / composers / writers in your setting

I had one plot hook about a famous painter being assasinated. She was famed for making portraits of many noblemen and was killed by an impostor king after being forced to paint his face over the old king's portrait, in order to silence her. Her name was just Emerald,. her assistant, Jade, was able to flee but was captured and imprisoned in a brothel in the setting's Las Vegas, from where the PCs found her and found this story.

>>96781299
You'd be surprised, but yes, fully feral head and fully human body will weed out most of them.
You might attract some horny ancient egyptians though.

>>96775157
Neighboring country/region/city just woke up the local ancient evil and got destroyed in the aftermath, causing an influx of refugees and survivors (PCs among them) to the nearest safe town?

What are you guys using to organize your notes? I hate all the options in pinned links and I am slowly losing myself in all the folders.

I just got redpilled on introducing guns into my fantasy game. Not just for the PCs, but having arquebuses into armies as a common thing, let's say its a XV-XVI century parallel.

The implications on warfare are easy to infer from real world history; though I intend to make heavy cavalry still viable through new armor materials (alchemy is a very important part of the setting. So much, actually, that I had to introduce gunpowder as it was ridiculous that nobody had ever found it yet; but I want to introduce fantasy alchemy too)

Gunpowder can also be nerfed in magical ways, such as summoning fog to impede aiming (but match light still giving away the gunmen position), rain, etc; mostly so the world doesnt evolve into trench warfare anytime soon,

I think I can use ideas on the monster aspect, as in; What monsters are less and most impacted by humans having access to guns and cannons? cont.

>>96785470
dragons for example are very vulnerable to guns, if they are smaug-type dragons that are mostly defended by their "plate" armor.

Orcish hordes are also at great disadvantage unless they can copy firearms (which i dont like) so i dont think they make for good monsters in this setting unless they resort to stealth and attcack small groups instead of cities.

So, with hordes out of the question, what are some monsters that can justify having castles and city walls and that can't just be shot away by a handful of city guards?

I know: other men. But any other? I'd like to have peasant evacuations inside the walls as a relativelly common thing happening in order to justify classic feudalism

>>96785624
dragons:
only bullets to the eyes can reach brain and drop it, very very hard shot to make
cannons can drop it if aiming for the vitals only, or the head, a cannon cannot be aimed quickly so it must be some sort of trap

bullets in general:
in 2025 it takes a big gun to kill an elephant, rhino, hippo but crocodile not that big i think
>muskets are much weaker than 2025 guns
>muskets were stopped by plate armor when they were invented and used in warfare, the armors were tested before sold, and sold with a bullet impact as proof
There is a lot you can do with this, enjoy.

When worldbuilding a species, is mention of neoteny as a reason for a feature evolving inherently uncomfy?

>>96786323
Unless you're going out of your way to highlight it and use it as an excuse to magical realm the PCs.

>>96785624
>>96785969
I would argue that dragons need to be light to fly with hollow bones and light scales. They're strong, but if you can pierce it, the dragon takes a ton of damage. I argue that bullets would be a good choice against dragons.

>>96786521
>need to be light to fly
an Airbus A380 does not get stopped by rifle bullets, yet it is hollow, easily pierce-able by small-caliber gunfire, and light for it's size. Only well placed shots to the turbines, fuell tanks or pilots' cabin may threaten it.
I propose that small dragons are vulnerable to bullets, and as they grow, no longer are. Fair?

>>96769016
I have it different depending on the kingdom and all. Some have the first born groomed since birth for the role. Others have it based on proving it through deeds and honors. Where others have that battle royale, or have to gain the favor of the other nobles.

>>96743359
Where do I read people's worldbuilding works?

>>96743359
https://www.tomassanchez.com/gallery

>>96786770
I'm just saying that once you get beneath a dragon's scales, they should be relatively squishy. But those scales are monsters to get through. A bullet is perfect for the task, even with an older dragon. I wouldn't give a stat buff, but I bet that the creatures hate firearms.

>>96786521
Wouldn't a dragon's mass be a significant issue? Shoot an elephant with 5.56×45mm NATO once in the limbs, yeah it will hurt it but it's not gonna cause damage it can't recover from. Apply the same thing to something the size of a blue whale, most penetrating blows to tissue aren't gonna be very impressive either unless you're talking about blasting it with grapeshot or something from a 12lber cannon. I don't see any kind of hand-held gun being a significant issue to a dragon, even one the size of a grizzly since those can take several shots center mass and not go down as well (and then kill you).

>>96789093
My point was that they are likely very light compared to a sea or land animal with hollow bones. I know that might not be RAW, but it makes sense to me. Then a piercing blow would do more damage than a slash or bludge.

Is it normal to keep things a mystery even from myself?
On one hand, as a creator I should lay the groundwork even for parts not appearing in the story, and ideally determine whether nothing connected to them indeed does not factor into the story, but on the other hand, when everything is written down and detailed, I have no fun looking at my own setting, as it holds no secrets to me.

>>96789168
That's called "Discovery Writing" and it's totally valid. Still, if you don't do it right, it gets tedious. If I were you, I'd focus on RPing your NPCs to the letter of what they would actually do and let the story unfold based on character actions.

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a note for flying animals is that they are LIGHT for their size

for example, the largest pterosaurs were about the height of a giraffe

but they weighed less than some domestic pigs

a flying animal would be much, much weaker than it's height would suggest. The giraffe-sized hatzegopteryx would likely get bodied by an actual giraffe in a head on collision

>>96789284
>This
And I know dragons are seen as something different, but I play them like flying beasts. But they have strong scales. If you can pierce the scale? That's really damaging to them!

My own dragons are simply powerful enough that they can raise their massive weight anyway. The flap of their wings is equivalent to a minor explosion.

And very noisy.

>>96789168
>https://www.tomassanchez.com/gallery
if you build en encounter between heroes and NPCs, randomize the NPCs that will be used that way you don't even know yourself what the fight is going to look like
You may be able to do the same with world things but I don't know how you would do it.

>>96786323
Sounds like magical realm to me, but I'm here for it. Usually, though, people just do these things and don't call attention to them.

>>96743359
Has there been any media that explored the concept of technology developing in your stock fantasy world?
Especially one that explored the issues the different races like elves dwarves and humans would have as technology starts emerging?
I am looking for inspiration.

>>96790282
Consider the boring stuff like measurement. I suggest reading about the development of the metric system, and the history of standard measurement outside that. If you want technology, being able to specify the details of the screw you want and the guy you are hiring to make them knows what you mean and can actually do QC to make the 3000 you ordered actually in spec. As far as I'm aware, the only story specifically about what you're asking about would be something like A Hero's War.

Measurement and logistics are fucking poison to general audiences, you're not gonna have much on the development of these important boring things. Catch That Witch and other stories will cover the "sexier" parts like guns or whatever, so just look up a list of works with the industrialization or nation building tag for that. Nectar of Dharani is softcore porn, but it's about the result of a stock fantasy world having just finished a big transformation into a more industrial world and explores different races in each volume more or less.

>>96790282
"A man is not dead while his name is still spoken"
I guess it was inevitable.

>>96790282
Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura
it's a CRPG that's basically just a regular fantasy setting but in the middle of an industrial revolution
it's been years so my memory might be not entirely correct, but from what I can recall of it:
>technology works by applying and exploiting the constant laws of physics; magic works by locally warping these same laws
>magic and technology consequently don't get on well, with potentially disastrous results (such as if fucking with thermodynamics around a steam engine with a bigass boiler full of lethally hot steam)
>industrialization has upended the status quo, with less magically inclined races leveraging it to suddenly dominate, and the more innately magical ones falling behind
>setting and story examine the consequences and changes of these developments
>don't ask why there's so many half-ogres

>>96790339
>Nectar of Dharani is softcore porn, but it's about the result of a stock fantasy world having just finished a big transformation into a more industrial world and explores different races in each volume more or less.
>isekai
>softcore porn
I guess the “research purposes” meme actually works for once.
Thanks!

>>96790396
>arcanum
Thanks! I’ll look at that too!

>any mention of one of the eldritch god's many names eventually warms medium carrying - book, tablet, brain... - to also include all other his names, including, eventually, his true name
>his true name is always legible in whatever language the medium is written (or whatever person's inner dialogue is)
>since practically no language contains the sounds the name consists of, or letters/symbols to convey them, such symbols appear, which the reader always understands, and remembers as being part of the language he is reading in, although he cannot remember or transcribe the symbols themselves
>anyone who has readvpr heard the true name is irrevocably mentally broken; they might resist for a while, but eventually will be compelled beyond resistance to say it out loud
>since the sounds the name consist of cannot be produced by mammalian vocal chords, the process warps and breaks them, because nothing can stop the name from being uttered
>cutting out one's tongue or sewing the mouth shut only causes the process to horrifically warp the mouth area as well
>after uttering the name once the victims usually spend the short remainder of their lives howling and spewing blood from broken throats

Eldritch enough?

>>96791400
Oh, and
>any euohemism or metaphor you use to refer to the god to avoid using one of its names eventually becomes one of its names, as universe catches up

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Should I account for how powers act with and without equipment or go all in on one or the other?

>>96792753
Yes.

>>96792753
it's your setting, do what you want
flip a coin if you have to

>>96789168
I have a setting where dozen of generational space ships cololize far of star system.
I still have no satisfying reason on why humanity decided to send those space ship in the first place.
If i couldn't came up with fun/interesting explanation about something, i just put "mystery" as the explanation.

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>>96789284
>>96789308
>>96789839
My dragon use magic to fly, i know it's controversial.
But, i love to live in the edge.

That's my boy.

>>96794266
Commercial reasons?

>>96794266
Space exploration is science.
And science is not about why, its about why not.

What are interesting metaphysical schools of thought that focus on duality of good and evil, or light and dark, but are not Christianity-derived?
As much as I love Christian mysticism, Kirkbride has used Gnosticism in his setting so well I don't feel like using it or any other Christian philosophy myself.

>>96758395
empires, in the midst of a "golden age". latest major conquest is in the bag, next one is yet to start. Economic niches everywhere for new buisiness ventures.

leaves a few openings for world events.
>an as-yet unconquered country invading.
border skirmishes with barbarian tribes.
>expeditions across the seas get funded to strange places (I always make seas eat magic and prevent magical travel across).
merchants, fat on new opportunities, investing in strange research, perverse art, lavish stunts, and countless trade caravans (guards included)
>PTSD WARMAGES.
a wealth of fresh landowners inheriting land as part of their veterans benefits and finding new challenges like wolves eating sheep.
>a shadowy group of nobles attempting to overthrow the emperor and throw a fictitious relative/actual child relative onto the throne
TAX FRAUD

>The surface of Europe in my setting is a primordial land where giant beasts like those in the Ice Age roam free on vast, never ending plains and forests.
>Humans, therefore, need to be tough and smart to survive. And so, through centuries of trial and error, they have developed a basic martial art called Hunting Techniques (Jagdtechniken) to hunt the giant bison, bears, and other monsters that keep humanity down.
>The technique prioritizes careful coordination, athletic movements, and long range attacks to surround, wound, and weaken their gigantic, intelligent prey until it can just be speared in the throat.
>One of the key issues is that these beasts are far more intelligent than IRL animals, almost on human levels. So we need careful coordination to defeat them, and simple traps just won't do. Especially for social animals that can warn each other about our tricks.

>Most hunting packs consist of 5-10 huntsmen, though hunting pack animals can call for giant packs of upto a hundred or more huntsmen. Their primary weapons include javelins to stab and bleed out the prey, ropes to trip and slow them down, bows and arrows, and a heavy halberd called the Wolfsbane.
>It's a bit like whaling, but the whale is trying to hunt you.

Just for clarification, this isn't all of humanity. Just the settlers of Europe.

And as an aside, I am having trouble finding images for this. Any help?

>>96772751
besides this being generally wrong scientifically on so many levels, assuming things left unmentioned work the same way as reality does, then these mountains and mountain ranges would cast some huge ass rain shadows creating gigantic deserts all over the place.
Honestly depending on the density of the mountain ranges more than half of the land would probably be a huge patchwork of deserts.
The lands that capture all that humidity would be extremely wet and if near an equator would suffer through catastrophic monsoons if bordered by a large sea and terrible floods and rainfall filled with lakes swamps and rivers
these are the most obvious and immediate things that i could think of

>>96789118
anon even if they had hollowed bones something the size of a dragon would require incredible muscle density and strength to fly around nimbly.
they also have scales that are at least a couple of inches thick
even modern firearms would do absolutely nothing to a dragon in most locations

>>96790282
one important note. industrilisation was entirely based around a shit ton of coal being available and a ton of other technological societal and cultural conditions.
If you dont have something like the carboniferous and hundreds of millions of years to create the coal, gas and oil reserves of today then you will need another resource at best to fuel the industrial revolution

>>96796171
this is just some paleolithic neanderthal power fantasy. anything related to that era and especially hunting will fit

>>96796522
How demeaning. I meant for them to be medieval Germanic warriors.

>>96796722
i am sorry anon but you literally described neanderthal hunting parties to a T.
if you want them to be superhuman you could honestly make them straight up neanderthals with small admixtures of warlike humans like the bell beaker culture that birthed the ancient germanic nations

>>96796866

I can see the comparisons, but Neaderthals never had to contend with supermassive animals that were almost as smart as a human.

>>96773126
>>96773712
This, the transitional period where firearms and high medieval equipment overlapped lasted for hundreds of years. There's no firearm/fantasy paradox, the presence of firearms just means that civilization is at some point on that technological transition. This is easy unless you're one of thoe George R R Martin retards that wants a society with stagnant technology for thousands of years.

>>96796722
NTA but it also sounded Paleolithic to me as well (which is honestly a cool and underutilized setting). Having medieval-level technology and presumably cities and civilization combined with hunting Pleistocene megafauna just sounds a bit strange to me.

>>96790282
Have you read the Discword novels? Some of them explore that very idea.

GNU Terry Pratchett. Some of the last novels of his I read were a bit weak (I think it might have been the Alzheimers), but still leagues better than modern dross.

>>96790396
I used to chat with some of the Arcanum devs back in the day.
I should check Cain's Youtube page some day. Maybe comment on a recent video and see if he recognizes my name?

>>96775272
You could go with Ahriman or Angra Mainyu. I'm sure there's plenty you could steal from Zoroastrianism.

And now for my thing (I hope I'm allowed to post. I seem to be having some problems)
In the setting/world I'm writing I wanted to avoid the typical thousands upon thousands of years long history. I think it'll be around 2000 years old? 3000 tops.

I'm torn on whether or not I want titanic sized creatures with settlements on their backs.
On one hand The world has enough going on that it doesn't need them, on the other the concept is really cool adn the ancients that built the world filled it with megafauna and wonders for entertainment.

It would also fit the setting as the world has very rapid geographic change. A mountain could grow in a human lifespan, a lake in a year. Villages might be a bit more north or west than they were last year. A part of me thinks nomadism might be more common than in real life.

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>>96797394
I really should get used to expanding the text box to get a better view of a post before pulling the trigger. I also forgot to add an image due to the system having some issues with my post.

>>96794879
Zoroastrianism is probably the most obvious example of non-Abrahamic moral dualism, but given its (supposed) heavy influence on the Abrahamics, its concept of morality might sound too familiar for your liking.
some elements of Ancient Egyptian religion kinda have an order/chaos theme, but (from what fragments have survived to be studied) I get the impression that calling it explicitly morally dualistic might be a bit of a stretch.
I haven't really read much into Gnosticism yet (for much the same reason as yourself) but for all I know it might be possible to reinterpret it in a different angle, or utilize elements that other settings haven't.
>>96796495
>industrilisation was entirely based around a shit ton of coal being available
which IIRC was in turn due to introduction of steam power: apparently coal deposits strongly tend to be flooded (or something along those lines) so while its properties and value as fuel were long understood, it wasn't really feasible to exploit them in any large scale until steam pumps became available (supplanting less powerful/reliable wind pumps) to clear all the water out

>>96797192
I love both medieval warriors and giant megafauna.

>>96797774
Sure but a medieval civilization is supported by vast and extensive agricultural economies. Do people just hunt the megafauna for sport, or to keep them away from the farmlands?

>>96796976
That's true if you include firearms like hand cannones, matchlocks, wheellocks and flintlocks. Players generally want little to do with the first three and flintlocks can be a hard sell as most people know those are essentially single shot weapons without a lot handwavium. When players want revolvers and other similar era firearms, did they exist with medieval armor and equipment? The answer is usually, "no."

Does anyone have good names for currency? My game has sort of been dancing around the issue since money isn't tracked in this system, but we are getting to the point where not mentioning money has gotten conspicuous.

Background: 16th-century ish city vaguely Prague ish. Does a fair amount of trade abroad. Has abundant access to copper and tin via the local mines, and likely ends up with a fair amount of gold via trade, but the nobility hordes and melts down silver for its special properties so you'll never find a silver coin in the city.

What should the currency work like, and what should it be called? I'm toying around with the idea of cheap bronze coins being their locally produced currency, backed not by the inherent value of the metals involved but by the status and promise of the trading power that the city represents. Copper coins act as an alternative, being valuable for their inherent metal so they can be traded with places that don't trust the bronze coins for much, and gold gets used where appropriate as much higher value currency.

Thoughts?

>>96794879
The Cathars are interesting, even if they were technically a christian sect they believed in duality between two gods, one that is responsible for heaven and the soul and the other which made the world and its sinful pleasures to keep your soul trapped here so you would never escape the cycle of being reborn in his domain.

>>96794879

Literally every other Abhramic faith, plus their manichean forerunners.

>>96798675

Sea shells

>>96796919
what do you think mammoths were? are a couple of points of intelligence the difference here?
most large animals were hunted with endurance hunting as far as we know. most big animals were too clever to fall for simple traps so they were hunted exactly by the types of groups you described with the very techniques you mentioned

>>96797774
>>96797839
pretty much what he said.

My advice to you would be to have a more northern north that wasnt as affected, where these megafauna survived the end of the ice age that caused them to dominate europe and now some time during the middle ages another ice age has come and the remnants of germanic feudal society had to return to the old ways of hunting megafauna to survive producing the warrior you so desire

>>96798675
Obols for the bronze/tin coins and Kronen for the silver gold minted ones

Also for the love of god dont have coinage whose value isnt directly tied to the value of the metals in a preindustrial society. Just have them be low value coins with cheaper metals that the commoners use in every day life and the silver/gold ones used only by merchants and nobles.

paper money existed but for a billion reasons guarantying the value of money in a time before money printing wasnt possible, so your coins will have to be worth their real value.

>>96799125
NTA, but what if it turned into Land Whaling? Oil or some other precious commodity can be rendered from their bodies.

>>96799180
that means venturing into the lands of monsters to hunt dangerous beasts. I can see it being akin to whaling and a gruesome job
I can also see it being something the nobility does as a sport, because the holy roman empire is peaceful and they re kinda bored so they go on medieval hunting safris in the polars to get mammoth tusks and sabertooth pelts for their great halls to flex on the other lords

>>96798585
Oh, sure. That's honestly the reason I dislike D&D like systems with so much HP bloat. A high lethality system will show you how similarly lethal most weapons are at the right distances, with the advantage of more mordern firearms lying largely in compact armor penetration.

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What shit do you handwave, and what shit do you REFUSE to handwave? I think this is really the crux of worldbuilding, defining your focus.

Personally I will often handwave ecology and biology almost every time. It's not that it's not interesting to me but it's so far from my area of expertise I make sure to downplay those details as much as possible and keep it ultra simple.

On the other hand, I refuse to handwave economics at all, it is the framework through which the entire setting is understood honestly. This town isn't here because of geology or whatever, it's there because of the fact someone was able to produce and reap the benefits from something there. Having good farmland or gold ore doesn't matter unless you can turn it into a productive venture, or that's how I look at it anyways, and so it gets excruciating detail and drives the development of everything else it touches (which is everything).

>>96790407
>>96790417
Damn these do the fantasy industrial revolution thing I’ve been on for a while better than I probably ever will.
I really like arcanum’s thing of making magic and tech at odds forcing the sentient races to pick a side.

I also feel like I should have known about these medias before hand yet somehow missed them.

>>96796495
I might default to just having coal exist instead of some magical resource but maybe I’ll change my mind.
>>96797394
I haven’t read the discworld novels but I’ll look into them too.

I’ll confess I find /lit/ a bit too bitter sometimes so I use this place instead for worldbuilding or trying to figure out how to write the background lore of a world.
Anybody else do this?

I’m asking because a friend is turning his setting’s world into the basis for a novel he is writing in his spare time.
He isn’t making our campaigns part of the story though because he wants it to be a bit more of a serious tone than the generally wacky hijinks me and the party got up to.

>>96796459
Still, fighter jets are less durable than a tank per se. I'd just argue that they should be a hair squishier than a high level land monster.

>>96800716
I don't like to "handwave" much. Mostly I will improvise anything that comes up with a small understanding of the entire world. I don't reveal all too much to my players about the world, adding to the story I can present with my personal knowledge.
>Economics
Each city has a main trade good and works with neighboring cities. It never gets brought up until a player needs the info.
>Ecology and Biology
Animals and beasts are different in my world and each has a niche in the world. There are dedicated farms to certain animals while others are wild. It's not the most detailed list, but there's enough there for me to work the background stories.
>Royalty
No handwaving
>Magic
Schools are created if my players can ever find them.
>Rest
Without describing downtime, the game is hard to get into. I like this bit of verisimilitude as well.
>Ruins
I think this is one of the few things I handwave. If there is an ancient forest or ruins, they can just be like that. If a player cares enough for the history of a decrepit stone in the woods, I'll make something up, but I don't always have something prepared. If the ruins are important to the quest? Sure. But if they stumble on a little statue? I'm not afraid to do the whole "You have no idea who this is supposed to be in reference to or who made it."

>>96797517
>which IIRC was in turn due to introduction of steam power: apparently coal deposits strongly tend to be flooded (or something along those lines) so while its properties and value as fuel were long understood, it wasn't really feasible to exploit them in any large scale until steam pumps became available (supplanting less powerful/reliable wind pumps) to clear all the water out
The big thing with coal is that it is both fuel (for steam engine) and the thing you use the pump for. If you were trying to mine something else that way, e.g. copper or iron, the inefficiencies of the early steam engines would be a huge detriment because you'd clear cut the forest around it, and then how would you continue to fuel it?

>>96797839
To keep them away from farmland. There's not much sport in it, because it's a dangerous and important job.

The whaling comparison wasn't just an one off thing. People die on these missions. It's why it's such a highly paid job. Not only do they get meat and other animal products that are scarce in medieval societies, but they also ensure humanity doesn't get shoved away from Europe.

The rest of the world is far more habitable. Megafauna are only present in the colder northern regions.

>>96800716
I handwave economics, because I find the subject distasteful. I do the bare minimum but that's it.

I refuse to handwave metaphysics, languages/cultures, and chronology. Also physics, to an extent - while I hadwave finer stuff, I do keep note of how laws of nature are different in my world, and what are implications of that (e.g. if world is flat, Earth-like days and seasons need explaining)

Would "adventurer guilds" basically be mercenaries?

>>96804306
More or less.
Mercenaries IRL were mostly organized like an army or warband. Not as freelance as adventurer guilds you see in games or anime.

I don't think realistically anyone would actually WANT freelance mercenaries around.
When you have a warband, at least you can negotiate with its leader, exert control. But you can't control a swarm of freelancers without copious expenditure of resources.

>>96804431
IRL there aren't monsters either. But yeah I'm not fond of the concept of adventuring guilds.

>>96804588
>IRL there aren't monsters either
You'd be surprised.

Azathoth is public domain now, so I'm borrowing him. Not the name though, he doesn't need a name. Who's going to name him anyway?

Mine will be the primordial black hole that once used to be the Universe. The Big Bang scattered his essence and created the Universe, which accidentally made him too muddled to think.

His power, however, still flows through ALL energy in the Universe. Part of his power is what ancient humans worshipped as the Sun, but now modern humans known it's merely an infinitesimal atom of its existence.

And sooner or later, the Big Bang will stop, reality will collapse again, and he will be reborn as good as whole.

>>96805001
>Not the name though, he doesn't need a name. Who's going to name him anyway?
>Mine will be the primordial black hole that once used to be the Universe.
So neither name nor description... so why does it matter if he's public domain?


>And sooner or later, the Big Bang will stop, reality will collapse again, and he will be reborn as good as whole.
Is it going to happen in mortal lifetime, or more like billions of years?

>>96805051
Tens of billions.

>>96805001
I too am often too muddled to think after I bang.

Does Earth canonically exist in your setting, either as a planet or a different plane in the Multiverse?

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>>96807563
My setting takes place on earth, just in the future.
Specificially in east asia.

>>96807593
Jesus Christ, that looks horrifying.
How many people live in that hellhole? Looks like two billion at least.

>>96807660
During it's height, probably at least a couple of billion people, supported by entire stretches of the City dedicated entirely for food production and agriculture, however after the collapse of that golden age and the massive civil war that wracked trough the City, it is massively depopulated and probably only has people in the couple of hundred millions at the most, concentrated in the scattered still relatively intact sections of the City. Most of the City is in just made out of ruins overgrown by the City's own tissues as well as out of control plantlife that began to spread troughout the City as the controlled ecosystems etc within it collapsed.

One of the precursor races are currently called the Golden Ones, since they had golden skin, hair that was actually liquid metal (golden colored, but not gold, obviously), and used gold out the wazoo. They also achieved technomagical mastery to the extent they might have killed a god (its hard to tell, because when a god dies, whatever he embodied ceases to exist, even its concept ceases to exist, word for it ceases to exist, etc). Luckily, they got wiped out.

However, I suck at making up names, so ideas are welcome.
(inb4 orokin)

>>96809008

Theoctonoi

>>96809008
Helianthropi

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the fantasy map generator is no joke in OP

>>96809008
Auric or Aurean.

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Alright, so here is what I got right now
>Roshan
Starting desert content for players, mainly filled with Humans, bandits, and mauraders in an Arabian knights-type setting. Sand Skiffs are the main mode of transportation out on the dunes
>The Sontem Islands
This is where the rich and influential come for some R&R in a tropical setting that would make Dubai blush
>Esthial
You'll find the Elfs here in gleaming ivory towers with haflings tending fields and crafting the sweetest ales and ciders
>Morior
The Northlanders here are ruthless, tough, and perform expeditions beyond the white veil of the north for resources and seem to be searching for something
>Alderso
The Dwarves, in their master crafted mountain homes, forge statues, armor, mines, and cities that, from abov,e look to run like a massive clock
>Castaval
More of a massive canyon than a continent where the Dragonborn and Lizardfolk come to create music and uphold traditions in the highest regard, honor is everything here
>The united hoards of Kalthron
A once nomadic Orc tribe that had conquered other tribes in the region. Believes that true strength comes from power earned, not given or bargained for. Warlocks and Sorcs are looked down on, while a Spell Blade is seen as the pinnacle of having mastered arcane and strength
>The Telleris Wildlands
A massive sprawling content covered by a forest with crossing into the faewild overlooked by a colossal tree with its top piercing the clouds above.

>>96811494
large world, nice what's next?

>>96812123
Trying to figure out a reason why players would go to different contents after the first arc in Roshan with the King of Thieves. I got ideas for other continents, just not a reason why they should go out into the world.

>>96812237
maybe build it and let them go wherever they want
new spells, weapons, armors, character points need to be obtained somehow, they should get attacked and ambushed often so they feel like they need to get stronger or get better equipment

>>96812274
True, more think of the other continents as hooks instead of "Alright, pick which track you'd like the train to go down!"

>>96812306
might have to look into hex-crawling for a large world like this, I don't know how it works but it looks promising, then you can railroad a bit in between traveling to run through the well-crafted dungeons or points of interests that you decide to make
some anon in another thread was telling me to leave a note saying a ship is leaving for another island in 3 days, so that's what I'm gonna do for mine

>>96812237
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhI7qOCojYo&t=19s

>>96804431
That's the whole point of a guild, it's a method of self-regulation.

>>96813264
It's more than than. It's also a legal entity responsible for enforcing the rules and regulations of a decentralised state regarding said profession.
Besides having the capacity to represent the wellfare and interests of said professionals against the state

>>96807563
Yes, though it's no longer considered the capital world of humanity. Not because it isn't a major planet, but because the current interstellar government started out as colony worlds rebelling against Earth. They later let Earth join their federation (mostly because Earth still had the largest shipyards in human-occupied space), but for obvious reasons they didn't move their capital there. Earth is still salty about the who thing.
Earth is also probably the worst shithole in the setting, except maybe the one plane covered with swamps where 90% of local wildlife is highly venomous or carries deadly pathogens. It's basically the cyberpunk planet ruled by a conglomerate of megacorps, with most of the population being dept-slaves worked to death to enrich their corporate overlords. The environment is beyond fucked by rampant industrialization, to the point most of the population lives in environmentally sealed arcologies, with only the desperate or insane trying to survive in the toxic wastelands outside.

>>96814016
>planet ruled by a conglomerate of megacorps, with most of the population being dept-slaves worked to death to enrich their corporate overlords. The environment is beyond fucked by rampant industrialization
Sooooo, just real world?

>>96814036
I mean, the setting is supposed to at least give the appearance of the real world (albeit habitable planets are more common than they really would be) a couple of hundred years in the future, so Earth more or less is modern trend of huge multinational corporations becoming increasingly powerful at the cost of the average citizen but cranked up to 11. Many of the various colony worlds are takes on other science fiction society tropes.

Okay, text outline is ready, time to start drawing the map of the world.
Will take at least 20 A4 sheets.
Wish me luck.

>>96743359
What do you need to do in order to have a good magic school in your setting?

>>96817594

Something to make it different from JKR

>>96814758
Are you going to be generating the world as you go according to how reachable it is from the campaign's starting point so as to actually finish it until it needs to be update because the heroes have advanced sufficiently enough to need new elements in the world?

>>96817814
No, I'll draw the general important bits, then take individual A4s and go in-depth on each, as if that was a whole setting, so that each part of the world is full of stuff. I'll also draw versions of each sheet before the great cataclysm, with different geography and country borders.

Its for myself, I'm not sure I'll ever use it for a campaign. I generally use more simplistic stuff for campaigns. Players want to kill monsters and have cool stories, not solve the metaphysical riddles or delve into detailed centuries of history.

>>96817594
Read old east european legends and fairy tales about Scholomance.
Read Wizard of Earthsea. That's the quintessential magic school.
Ignore Harry Potter.

>>96818507
>Read Harry Potter lite
>Don't read Harry Potter
Ask me how I know you're a troon.

>>96820601
Hah, nice one, took me a second to get the joke.

>>96817594
Make it like a school and not like Harry Potter or a gay tran knockoff after she didn't agree that trans people can be whatever they say they are at the moment.

Also don't make it for kids, I can get older teens 16+ but let be honest. Avoid any of the houses or everything is magic gimmicks. I would suggest it being more like a college/university than modern school. This is more gathering of skilled minds and letting them easy learn and work on their projects then a place of teaching kids magic 101 and all. That would be more for tutors or a club a school for nobles and all.

>>96821321
>>96821324
Which king looks more chad?

>>96821321
That makes me think of Dimitri from Fire Emblem Three Houses/Hopes

>>96821326
The old one, obviously.

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Tried to figure out the physiology of the Ogres in my setting, both in terms of the male and female ones. I have envisioned them having almost Elephant seal style sexual dimorphism, though not due to evolution, but because of genetic engineering. The males were designed for frontline combat and warfare, being extremely robust, durable and prone to violence, whereas the females were designed for both birthing and raising the next generation of ogres as well as generally more "home front" labor and what not, as their physical strenght, as well as the engineered generally docile temperament they have made them excellent laborers.

>>96824203
Did you draw these??

>>96826105
Yes.

>>96826415
good, now draw her pregnant

>>96826415
brilliant

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>>96826424
I have an entire faction within the setting who have warriors whose armor makes them look preggers.

>>96826458
Thanks!

I realized that as sphinxes have paws for hands, they might not be able to hold certain objects such as pens. Or can they? Alternatively, how can such objects be adapted for paws?

So crazy that /tg/ doesn't allow pdfs anymore.
My worldbuilding has reached a poiint in which I cannot write it just by post; here is a 3 page document; if you know a better host, tell me.

https://www.mediafire.com/file/e640ujajf9n8itl/PLANETS.pdf/file

Tags: breathable atmosphere solar system, small planets.

Lots of implications to consider:

>no standard days in which to measure time in any way
>planets are reachable at anytime by who knows who; but at the same time they are pretty isolated systems
>In a planet with minimally tall buildings, people can functionally travel by flying through them
>What are the serious implications of having access to high gravity pull by walking into your basement?
>Criminals or other troubled people can leave their problems relativelly behind by jumping into the void and hoping to reach a random place
>Martial arts are also a way to deal with unwanted or potentially dangerous visitors.
>Technology levels are limited to what can be found on a given planet or harvested from "space"; no importations can be made on a reliable basis

>>96827425
some more
>tall buildings can also be a requirement if a planet is overpopulated or has little habitable soil. But the low gravity can make living at the top very unconfortable
>even if seas are not very deep or big by earth's standards, the incremented gravity makes them ripe for abyssal monsters
>Planets with functional eternal night allow to emulate noir ambients
>In general, the very isolation and climate variants allows for every planet be a minii-setting itself
>Animals of any size can "fly" as long as they don't approach a planet and crash.
>Anything in the "space" will eventually crash somewhere. Asteroids and meteorites are a constnat threat

>>96827092
If their paws function like cats' then they would lack opposable thumbs. I do wonder whether you could keep the appearance of paws but make the thumb opposable. Pandas get around the issue by having a "fake thumb" that lets them grab bamboo shoots despite technically lacking opposable digits.

>>96827425
>So crazy that /tg/ doesn't allow pdfs anymore.
Fucking why?

>>96829161
PDFs were the vehicle trough which 4chan was hacked this year.

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>>96829247
>can't have good things because hostile actors

>>96829655
If the worthless administrators of this shithole site had updated the security protocols they use that pdf exploit wouldn't even have been possible but apparently Hiroshima kept the same security setup fucking Moot left up back when he bought the site.

This is probably a stretch, but I dont want to make a thread and this is closest

Does anyone have the relationship chart for /tg/s generic fantasy setting?

>>96831481
>Does anyone have the relationship chart for /tg/s generic fantasy setting?

you mean the breeding chart?

>>96743359
So I have a Norse inspired faction in my setting

I based them somewhat off GRRM's Volantis
>Previously the King of Nordgard waged wars with everyone, plundering shit, taking foreign people as thralls
>Pissed off the fantasy Persians by enslaving a distant niece of the Emperor
>Pissed off the dwarfs by collecting "dwarf beards" as trophies from the dead
>Pissed off the elves by seizing their ships
>Persians and dwarfs ally to invade
>Elves invade at the same time
>Nordgard is super fucked up by the invasion, loses a lot of land, the King's sons are killed or gelded, his daughters commit suicide
>The Nordgardians reform by having three Magnates rule
>Two factions form- the Nordgardians of old families are known as Wolves and favour war
>The Nordgardians that prefer trade and mercantilism are known as Walruses
>The Three Magnates are usually 2 Walruses and 1 Wolf.
>The wolves still hold power because the Nordgardian gods bless those who survive a battle with death, and the Wolves have a lot of god blessed warriors
>Wolves primarily get experience and enslave thralls by serving as mercenaries for foreigners
>Walruses are wealthy and large in number, and their wealth has allowed Nordgard to mostly bounce back from the devastating invasion of three powers
>The Wolves sneer at Walruses for being "coin counters" but rely on them for wealth and supplies
>The Walruses sneer at Wolves for being dumb enough to want to attack other powers again, but rely on Wolves for their combat expertise
How is it?

>>96834668
I would push the Walruses into two groups for the three magnates. Have a "trade heavy" and craftsmen/farmer leaning group. So they tend to be seen as the same towards the wolves but where the Walruses are the classical merchants, the other group is the craftsmen who sell to the merchants, and your warriors with the wolfs. Also I would suggest switch the groups to the Dragons, Eagles, and Squirrels. Based of the Ratatoskr legends (Dragons the war caste, the Eagles the Farmers and Craftsmen, and the Squirrels the bankers and merchants.

>>96747053
a webcam and drawing on dry erase hex paper will be 1000% times more convenient and easy.
99% of VTTs are made to pedal the automation pipedream and then upsell DLC to whales.
AFAIK maptools is ancient and you're still going to have to "acquire" resources like tokens and maps for it.

>>96836120
I like those ideas.

I think the Walrus will instead be a clan symbol for one of the families. Thanks!

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Sharing dwarf token for print or VTTs

>>96824203
Who did the engineering, and did they make any other races? Also, what's the scale here?

>>96826925
What more can you say about them?

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>>96841634
>Who did the engineering, and did they make any other races? Also, what's the scale here?
The creation of the ogres took place during the "succession wars" which ravaged the massive. biomechanical City the setting focuses on. Who exactly was the group that first engineered the ogres is lost to history but as a collective group, the people responsible for their creation and propagation would be the warring inheritor families, which essentially were the various cadet houses and other royals/higher nobility of the City that were all vying for dominion and control over various sections of the City after the actual ruling imperial family was wiped out, plunging the City into a succession crisis that spiraled out into a massive civil war.

The ogres are just one example of many different types of chimera species that have been created troughout the City's history, and arguably even the "baseline" of humanity within the city has speciated a bit, with many different commoner lineages that stem from ancestors that either altered themselves, were altered or just were mutated by the mutagenic pathogens and other bioweapons that were unleashed upon the population during the succession wars. The noble families of the contemporary era of the City are also more like distinct races or subspecies than just highborn families due to these divergent lineages as well as self alteration and eugenics. Picture related is an example of the members one of the contemporary great houses, Baryx, who descend directly from the inheritor families so one could argue that their ancestors/kin were the ones who engineered the ogres.

>What more can you say about them?
I got a whole ass infographic for them here.
https://www.deviantart.com/screeble/art/The-Chorus-Militant-of-the-Sisterhood-1170562380
>tl;dr: Matriarchal fertility cult that holds near monopoly over reproduction in the City and has the self appointed goal of trying to restore humanity to a "pristine" state.

>>96839068
No problem. I like helping others with Worldbuilding if I can

>>96833799
I make humans the race that can breed with anyone and make half breeds (hints why their races are called Half-X.) outside of "True Dragons" and Gods.

Does you setting have an Underworld? What creatures live there?

>>96842465
So, the only setting of mine that has one is a faux dnd one (not played in dnd), mixed with mythological elements from norse mythology and Runequest. I combined the underdark with the underworld so you get the evil influence of the underworld turning all subterranean races evil, influencing them in different ways till if you go down enough you get to the land of the dead.
There are more details of course but i havent heavily fleshed it out because the players havent ever gone close to that place.

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It's me, the Jagdtechniken guy. Just wanted to introduce another Martial Art technique.

>Japan is currently occupied by a giant species of bear that is unusually intelligent and ferocious, sometimes deliberately seeking out humans.
>In response, people developed a martial art called the Zanjutsu, also meant to hunt giant beasts but with a special focus on 12 foot cave bears.
>The art focuses on careful, precise attacks at "soft regions" and Iajutsu style quick slashing attacks to avoid directly engaging the bear.
>The Bear is always aggressive and straightforward, which is why the art also focuses on quick footwork to weave around its jaws and slowly slash its face to ribbons.
>Only around 1000-2000 masters of this style existed at its peak due to its extreme requirements of speed and coordination. Ever since the bears started dying down, it became more focused on anti-human warfare.
>The Emperor, fearful of how it could allow common swordsmen to best armored Samurai, abolished its education for anyone not affiliated with the Imperial Capital.

In modern times, its still really good for fighting things that are fast and heavy but dumb and incapable of protecting its soft spots.

>>96844189
It's also one of the few martial arts that are still useful for Wizards. Its quick style is great for channeling energy bursts - which are usually converted into "Energy Slashes" or whips of glowing plasma.

However, its uniqueness makes it really expensive to learn. The only Wizards who bother are those that need to hunt supernatural monsters.

>>96743359
What books and other resources would you recommend for including alchemy in a setting?

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>>96743359
What would a medieval fantasy setting look like with WW1-era technology and a post industrial revolution society? I'm talking knights in plate armor manning muddy trenches with rifles, orcs dropping bombs from biplanes and such.
Are there any settings like this?

>>96846581
>chlorine
>artillery
>disease
>very likely to die by stray fire
>equally likely to die alone, cold, starving, with trench foot and pneumonia
Why would you want something so horrible?

>>96847104
That's so kino though

>>96846581

It wouldn't be medieval.

>>96846390

The Ken Talks About Stuff on, well, Alchemy, has a nice bibliography. r/gumshoe

>>96846581
Well, if there's to be any realism to it then it'll just look like WW1 with the odd pointy ear or bit of green skin added here and there, because the technology you speak of would promptly kill off all the earlier approaches to warfare (just like how at the start of WW1 we still have what's essentially Napoleonic lancers galloping around, who then they promptly went extinct.
But of course realism is something you can go easy on when making a fantasy setting, and in this case it's clearly just going to be a vague concept of a setting even, and as such it can look like whatever the fuck you want it to look like.

>>96846581
Victoria 3 Anbennar?

>>96846581
I mean that's not really medieval fantasy

Plate armor was pretty much never used long before WW1

Maybe a bit of steampunk instead would work?

In honor of the approaching end of the Maoists in India, I'm planning to add a small vignette about a failed Lunar Revolution.

Their motives will be that Tripuran central government won't let them control "their" resources, and Tripuran companies keep exporting their precious raw materials off-world with very little profit for local merchants and the powerful Trade Unions.

They also fear recent plans to terraform the Moon into a glorified space station for Solar System exploration and energy transmission.

>>96849376
However, their rebellion falls apart because while the Union *leaders* support them, most of the working and middle classes hate the idea of a violent revolution. Their use of asteroid drops on Earth bases also turns the Space Colonies against them.

After the first few months of combat, Tripura just blasts apart their rigged local fleets and send in the Mecha Corps to wipe them all out.

The leaders are executed by vacuum, ie thrown out of the airlock.

>>96846581
why do people want to staple on a dnd fantasy setting into ww1?
I ve seen this multiple times over the years. Is it the idea of elves and dwarves in the trenches? wtf is it?

There would be nothing left of the fantasy setting like the knights in armor in the trenches for the exact same reason they fizzled out in the 15-16th centuries irl
You would simply have fantasy races (maybe) and they probably wouldnt wanna participate in the world war either

>>96842465
It does. Its stratified into seven specific layers with their own qualities and quirks, populated by different kinds of creatures, and housing different biomes.
It is also sorta-kinda-alive. It expands on its own, maintains its structure (if you try to cave in large areas of it, be prepared for it to retaliate, actively defends itself from being flooded, etcetera.
While its by no means not complete, I've given though about how people living there would keep the air breathable, what would they eat, etc.

Aren't the laws of economics necessarily going to dictate the politics of any planet or country where individuals or nations can't violently attack each other?

How else can you exert power if you can't coerce people with threats of force?

>>96849860
Social stuff. Everything would be heavily ritualized, and social and verbal maneuvering would be incredibly convoluted and important.

I'm trying to reconcile in my head ideas of "elves are immortal and have low fertility so they have very little generational change" with "evil racist elves doing viking shit" without the latter dying out from picking too many fights. I was considering them breeding war slaves, but I don't want it to turn into some kind of fetish.

>>96853803

Elves are all badasses with a shitton of magical armor?
Elves reincarnate easily?
Elves are supernaturally apt to sneak up on unsuspecting villages?

>>96853803
Go jannisary route. Captured kids in raids, raise them into fanatically loyal soldiers.
Might even have them steal kids in times of peace, leaving behind changelings and shit.

>>96853803
Make them literal Reavers from Hel besides being super strong and all the other Elven stuff.
The strong ones have found a way to bypass the restrictions for the dead so they cannot die and after their first escape from Hel they dont age anymore and become truly immortal. Some dont manage to escape, a few occasionally get born so their population demographics stay the same but they are a real menace and almost impossible to get rid off

>>96854029
That seems a bit extreme, but the idea of them being secretly undead seems compelling. Might be an interesting bit of foreshadowing if someone picks up on a plot hole of their demographics.

>>96849821
Do the layers interact with eachother? How does one decent into deeper layers?

>>96800716
This makes me laugh a bit because in Economic Geology, we go through all the reasons why particular deposits are economical or not. Like, ever wonder why all the early gold rush shit was placer deposits in the river gravels of the mountains? It's because nature has already done most of the hard work for you and concentrated the gold in loose sediment that a random dude with a shovel and pan can go for. Then you run out of that, and you find the veins the placers weathered from. Then you dig deep until all the veins are depleted. Then you move to the porphery low percent bulk rock around it until the entire mountain is gone. All assuming no easier deposits, cheaper labor, new cheaper methods of transport, etc. are found.

Late stage mining is such an interesting thing.

Also, the geography and geology dictates the climate and biology as well where civilization is most present.

A good example of this is that most of our good harbors today are because sea level has been rising the last 11.5 thousand years. The backed up and flooded river valleys make everything from that to fjords. Can you imagine how fucked trade would be if everything was moving down? The greatly-increased rarity of good ports would ridiculously fracture sea trade. Then there's how magic and technology could change that. Fun things to think about.

Oh and soil erosion. Man, some fantastic books about that and crippling ancient civilizations.

>>96853803
>immortals
>dying out
L2english you spaz.

>>96853803
Have them not actually have low fertility but have them in-fight a fuckton and have all sorts of old grudges. Think full on fueds. That keeps them killing each other enough to keep the numbers in line. You can maybe even do a Highlander-type thing where the more elves an elf kills, the longer they live. So their greatest warriors tend to be ancient blood-crazed psychos who purposefully kill their own to maintain their power. Killing the lesser beings is just how they keep the supplies going to rule their eternal empire.

>>96849376
Small problem. The moon is a garbage heap mining-wise. The whole thing is mostly Anorthite and dust. Hell, most of its iron core is in Earth.

All the good shit is in the asteroid belt because that particular wrecked protoplanet was able to differentiate from the solar nebula enough to concentrate the metals before it got torn apart. There's a reason Ceres gets picked so much as the big mining colony in scifi. You really can't get around it.

Luna's main strength is as a launchpad into the rest of the solar system. It's the entire point of the Artemis missions.

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>>96855236
Not that Anon but, to me, the Moon would naturally be the Earth's offsite factory where a lot of industrial processes would be moved to along with Mars as well as acting as the major launch/receiving point for any materials and people going in and out.

>>96855519
The main advantage of the moon is it's terribly-low gravity. The big thing it's good for is a launch point. Refining would be good there, but better on Mars. The big thing about Earth is our gravity fucks most space travel. It's just too expensive to send things out of orbit. We're barely in the part of the rocket equation that lets us break free at all.

The moon would be a fucking amazing port, and little else.

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>>96855582
I get around some of the transport stuff by cheating with Dune style "Travel Without Moving" but forcing the last mile to be done by some kind of drop ship or vessel.

>>96855236
I didn't know that.

Still, it doesn't change much. If anything, it would add urgency to their desperation to not see whatever little resources they have get exported off world.

And its primary purpose in the OP was always going to be just a dock cum transmission station for Earth.

The rebels just don't like it because they're idiots that don't understand basic economics. Their dreams of autarky are just as delusional as WW2 Japan or Germany's.

That's actually not a bad idea, tbf. What if they also try to snatch Earth's resources in their "independence war"?

>>96856158
Definitely doable, but you need some kind of magic freight line to Earth like a Space Elevator.

>>96855018
On the same note, I was surprised when I read about just how many historic ports got silted out and economically ruined because of it.
Not something I've ever really seen happen in fantasy.

>>96856204
I'd never dare make a hard-ish scifi setting without space elevators.

>>96855236
The moon does have deposits of helium-3, which is very expensive and would make for a good fuel source for fusion reactors, so there's that, at least. Granted, asteroids are probably a better source, but the moon is closers so you'd likely start extracting it there to fuel the rockets needed to establish mining colonies out in the asteroid belt.

It would be very inconvenient if Luna has enough resources to be stable. It needs to collapse so that Earth can have its war.

Does the Solar System have enough organic molecules to allow for a trillion or more humans?

>>96857099
Substitute organic molecules for carbon and you will answer your dumb question.

>>96855018
But you realize you can proceed from "this is an economically viable area" and not elaborate on why right? If there is a mining village somewhere, it's because getting the silver from there is ecomically viable. What makes it so is less relevant.

This is part of the whole "what do you not care about" thing. You can handwave it if you don't care. You don't actually have to explain why it is, you just have to not say anything about it that would be obviously wrong.

>>96854885
They don't have very hard borders.
You get from one layer to another the simple way - tunnels and chasms

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Working out the ways humanity could use time travel to the past to bootstrap an advanced civilization.

After a few hours of hair ripping, I decided there's no way to make it possible with the Uplift paradigm. The old regime, ie the feudal aristocracy and religious groups, would never allow the economic reforms necessary for growth.

So I decided to just do it like we did IRL....mass murder. The future humans just time travel to the past, massacre their ancient predecessors, and take their place.

Then they do it again, and again, and again, until they're basically advancing thousands of years in just a few centuries of linear time.


Inspiration: the entire modern era from 1492 onwards. Between the Wars of Religion, the Colonization of America, Revolutionary Wars, and the Cold Wars, modernity and progress is consistently built on a pile of bodies.

>>96807593
Absolutely Kino map, anon.
Did you make it in phothoshop or sth else?

>>96860291
I made it in Clip studio paint.

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>>96858685
You can look into Lovecraft for that as well.

In the Shadow Out of Time it follows the story of a highschool/college professor who was forcibly body swapped with a Yithian who piloted his body for over a decade

I've lost interest in worldbuilding my campaign's setting. All the new ideas I'm having aren't tonally suitable. Wat do?

>>96861653

Play something else.

>>96861709
I quite like my campagn.

>>96861653
find when you made a choice that limited your options and correct that choice to re-open the possibilities

There's this Sultan in my setting who offers to give the Confederates new slave plantations to replace the ones they lost after the Civil War, but only if they convert to Islam first.

He's looking for a way to modernize his slave plantations and get a decent army at the same time. They are looking for a way to keep their old prestige....and out of sadism.

How attached were they to Christianity as compared to their self identity as slave owners? You think it's likely they take the deal?

The Union is quite fine with it because Lincoln wants to get rid of them anyway.

If we talking about fantasy middle ages style big city, should graveyard be placed inside city or outside of it?
Realistically it should near church, but I'm not sure it'll look good on the city's map

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>>96864183
Well, for starters, there'd be not one graveyard but many, maybe with one or several major ones, and smaller graveyards by individiual churches. Overall, if there's no intense religious demand insisting on making graveyards exclusively by churches, the graveyards would be outside city limits because space within walls or just in the main urban sprawl is expensive. Probably on some sort of hallowed grounds though.
That, the steady growth of a city, different classes receiving different treatment + cultural demand for graveyards near churches and accessible churches, basically means that a large medieval-style city would have many graveyards; some old ones and expensive ones within city limits, mostly. Paris had one with giant mass graves, so don't just make it a pure cash thing. There'd also be ones outside city limits, where the bulk of the dead would probably be sent, but with time they'd be enveloped by new urban sprawl and end up within new walls.

Also posting my God of Death because I want to post pretty pictures.

The Turks are the only Eastern people to ever defeat the West in any significant way, isn't it?

I'm planning to base my villains on them instead of China. I can't respect China.

>>96864562
Arabs/Moors
Russia(during napoleonic wars)
Huns(most horrifying defeat of western civilization, even germanic tribes couldn't compete)

If anything turks were pretty much contained in Greece

>>96864562
Japan beat Russia in 1905 which kicked off a lot of paranoia about Asia overcoming the West/Europe, look up "Yellow Peril."
The Pannonian Avars were East Asians and ruled a good chunk of Central/Eastern Europe for a while.
Huns and Moors which someone pointed out. You can also add the Islamic victories over the Kingdom of Jerusalem / other Crusader states although the Ottomans (and Venice) technically finished off the last few.
For modern stuff there's the Algerian War and Indochina which basically was the death knell of France's colonial Empire.

Maybe I should just merge the Islamic Kingdoms together under a single Prophet-King/Theocrat.

>>96864740
If you don't plan to do golden age of islam or arabic nights style setting, and just want them as dangereous enemies, then better do them as hordes

>>96864627
>Arabs/Moors
They got smashed once they made it to France, although getting them out of Sicily and Spain prove to be a challenge for the fractured feudal countries. But Berber pirates were a constant threat on the coastlines of Southern Europe well into XIX century.
>Russia
Eastern Europe is still Europe, and Russia was allied to Britain and Austria in that war.
>Huns(most horrifying defeat of western civilization, even germanic tribes couldn't compete)
You forgot Mongols, although they mostly exhausted themselves before reaching Western Europe. Still, their achievements in mass murder hold a candle to those of Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin, and they had dick for technology.

>>96864183
In Vienna, there was a cemetery around the central cathedral, which was moved into catacombs. Which were used for a while, until they got so overcrowded with corpses, it became impossible to hold mass in the cathedral due to the stench of corpses. Then new catacombs were dug out, and all corpses piled there.

>>96865025
Yeah, that's how I decided to do it, catacombs under church, but only for rich people.
Still not entirely comfortable with just moving commoners graveyards outside of city walls

>>96865063
French had giant mass graves in Paris and also buildings full of bones dug up from graveyards, as part of burying new dead. Commoners could get mass graves and piles of bones, while rich get their own graves or at least respectable crypts.

>>96865063
Commoners aren't supposed to get nice stuff.

>>96865154
Yes, but as anon said cities constantly expand, so commoner graveyards territories close to churches tend to end up inside city. Problem is that on the map something like that would look terrible.
Anyway, I solved it with catacombs and crypts. And it's only my autism that bothers me now

>>96865228
Moving graveyards is not impossible. Sending a bunch of criminals to dig up poor peoples' cemetery and transfer it to some common grave outside the city is perfectly normal.

So, I've been running a god sim through an AI, trying to focus on the cycle of empires.
Generally, it usually goes like this (with minor variations):
1. Give them fertility and abundance so the race can spread faster.
2. Wait until they slowly develop different cultures and kingdoms.
3. Bless one leader to unite them.
Here's the first problem: I can't imagine a new empire not imploding on the leader's death under these circumstances. I usually extend his lifespan to at least do some reforms and quell dissidents, so this usually takes more than a century.
4. A few centuries of a golden age (conquest of hostilities, expansion, mostly stewardship-style rulers, first encounters with ancient horrors).
5. Weaker rulers and more corruption in government systems.
6. The first succession crisis.
7. A recovery, with a ruler more or less trying to salvage the situation.
8. Everything goes to shit.
9. Ancient horrors appear again, destroying the capital, and the successor states are usually absorbed into an encroaching human empire in a century or so.

The problem is that I have very little variety despite running about five games, with most of the differences being small details because I just don't see any other way to do things, and trusting ai to jsut handle progression usually not satisfying. For example first blessing while race is still in tribal stage should always help them spread as fast as possible, because why would it be anything else...
Any takes? I'm okay with even bad ones

>>96866369
Roman Empire did not implode neither on Caesar's nor on Augustus's deaths. In fact it spread and expanded for many generations, despite really shaky succession algorithms.
Ottoman Empire, while it went it steep decline after the death of Suleiman the Magnificent, did not crumble overnight and took centuries to really diminish.
And that's leaving aside Byzantine Empire.

What you need to understand, that no matter how powerful he is, the ruler - even absolute one - is not the sole driving force of an empire. There is nobility and richest merchants, who might vie for power, sure, but most of all they are interested in maintaining an empire to profit from. Getting crowned is nice, but difficult, costly, paints a target on them, and reduces profits for a while. Easier to let some bastard of the last emperor get crowned and keep the business going.

And when there is succession crisis, it is often solved behind the scenes, with poison, dagger, and blackmail, without affecting the rest of the realm.

>>96867206
Outside of the Romans, who just had a "strongest wins" mentality—and it didn't matter how much the empire got fucked in the process—all your examples had hundreds of years of setting up systems and figuring out how legitimacy works.
It's easy to establish these structures when a kingdom expands slowly into an empire.
But with sudden, rapid expansion, it will more likely end up the same way as the empires of Alexander the Great and the Mongols did.

Actually when I think about it, it worked more or less great for arabs

>>96867336
The Macedonian empire of Alexander would be pretty much secure if his son was a decade older and Alexander living to his 40s wasnt such an unbelievable feat imo.
If he wasnt an unstable fuck then there might be a centuries long Greco-Persian empire in the East.
The fame and to a percentage the trust towards the the father really carries over to the son and basically secures them a chance at playing Emperor.
You can see it both with the sons of the good emperors in the roman empire and it carries on to the eastern roman empire aka the byzantines
It is the same with China as far as i know as well

>>96863133
>>96861653
I put them in anyway. My campaign doesn't have DnD or greek tier pantheons so I have my Achillean heroes be descendants nephilim rather than gods.

>>96868410
>I put them in anyway. My campaign doesn't have DnD or greek tier pantheons so I have my Achillean heroes be descendants nephilim rather than gods
I'd love to hear more on this please.

>Flesh out worldbuilding in my notes
>Sit down to write it all out in a proper handbook style
>Nothing I type feels right

I don't know why I'm so caught up on this, but it's frustrating me like nothing else. I know what the history of this setting is, but every time I sit down to try and write it all out like "In the beginning, XYZ happened. Then in year A, B happened", it all just feels Wrong and I don't know why.

Does anyone else know the feeling? Maybe I'm struggling because it doesn't feel entertaining enough to read, outlining the history of a setting, compared to outline what's going on -right now-. I almost want to abbreviate it, but doing so removes a lot of context that I feel could be important.

>>96870687
Give it a writing style, maybe like somebody in universe writing it either as a chronicle, a history, it could even be a university lecture at a class in the mage academy
I dont mean to go full writer on me but these types of setting setups were always the ones that worked best for me in rpg setting books and i think for most people as well
It doesnt have to be extremely flowery either. Even a little bit of character helps

>>96870687
I would suggest 3 things.
Like >>96870725 suggested have it be someone in the universe writing it down for a book or report.
That or break it apart based off races/ kingdoms/regions etc.
Or you can just do a simple doing like In the beginning XYZ happened then yeah A, B happen." Get it down then work on it and make it feel better after you got the first draft done.

>>96869698
I don't really have any good ideas about them. Elves, I guess, but by another name. Taller, stronger, more magically inclined creatures who placed great importance on philosophy, poetry and other !greek things. Most old Akhaians (!Grecoromans) probably carry a twinge of that ancestry, but the elites would form a separate social class through which they'd maintain their 'divine' blood. The Pankrator of Akhaios would assumably have the least muddled ancestry. As a result, he's sat the throne for over eighty years but does not look a day over forty. Long ears or horns or some physical signifier is pending - I don't think I need it, it keeps their origin as halfbreeds more mysterious.
>tfw keep adding magical halfbreed ethnicities of humans

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Does anyone know of a small notebook (ideally 3x5, like picrel) with hex grid paper? I want to draw maps at work, need something discreet that fits in my pocket

Looking for a fantasy race to play the role of Not!Mexicans in an old Western sense -relatively welcome members of the community and playable characters, but also clearly outsiders, coming from a land to the south where no one wants to go unless they're up to no good
Dwarves and elves have already been used doing other things
What does /wbg/ think?

>>96876619
Jotunns/goliaths. Halflings. Lizardfolk.

>>96876762
I'm putting in a vote for the lizards. Somehow the idea of gunslinging lizards in ponchos just works somehow.
You even get a free slur out of it - those fucking Scalebacks taking all the work.

>>96876619
I found it easy to use fox people with almost any culture

>>96876619
Mice, and maybe lizards. Or if you're WOTC, Orcs are now Mexicans.

>>96864773
They mostly stop due to the Khan dying and everyone heading back in hopes of being the new Khan. If they kept going they would invaded Rome by a year the time they quit to head about.

>>96877216
Pop culture nonsense, completely untrue.
Batu almost certainly didn't even know about Ogodei's death when he made the decision to withdraw.
The invasion had already hard stalled and Hungary had bled the Mongol armies to the point where retreat was a strategic necessity. The Mongols were not getting past Hungary and Poland, and certainly not through the much more fortified Germany if they did have some insane luck.

>>96876619
I t think you can start with making the no-good southland a necromancy-ruled land. Put Stirland and actual Mexico Day-of-the-Dead aesthetics into a blender, shake, stir, the result is entirely normal people who just are a bit macabre, might on average know too much about necromantic rituals and rites, and suffer a little from that necromancers are scary and use that reputation to ward off invasions.
Therefore, the fantasy race could be visually just humans, even, or the usual mix of races, but bear some sort of particular mark indicating that they're ostensibly servants of the Dark Lord Skellyfucker, less a full-on slavery brand and more a British passport. Or you could make them something sufficiently Day-of-the-Dead-ish. Maybe some sort of hermit crab people who use borrowed bones as extra protection, hence looking like crabs wearing skeletons.

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>>96876619
Drow

>>96877498
Nah, Orcs are mexicans/latinos now. Drow are still black as far as I know. Black Woke and/or Gay

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>>96876619
Putting in my vote.

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I need to create a wide variety of fantasy metals and their respective ores (and other minerals), alongside where how and why they are formed in the crust. Any inspiration?

>>96878254
Is there any reason why real metals and your basic bitch fantasy stuff like adamantine and mithril won't cut it?

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>>96878329
The world (or the slice of it I care about) is all about dwarves and mining. It's the core focus of the setting.

>>96878405
Steal the various ores from Terraria
I kinda agree with the other guy though, inevitably you're going to end up comparing metals to real world counterparts in function (this is Rockium, it's common and used to make cutting tools and armor kinda like steel), using those standard functional metals like iron, bronze, steel, silver, gold, etc for mundane stuff and making a small handful of magical fantasy metals for the cool rare stuff generally works out better
If you give absolutely every single material a special fantasy name people are going to check out faster, and the actual rare shit isn't going to be as big of a deal to them

>>96878405
Use world of warcraft for inspiration, in sense
>some ore is blood of old god
>some ore is because fel energy hit region

>>96878876
There are a lot more real world metals than the like 10 that are mentioned in 99% of fantasy settings. Rhenium or Technetium might as well be made up words for the vast majority of people, but many of these lesser mentioned elements are useful in some way or another. Obviously, with the tech level of a classic fantasy setting, you'd be hard pressed to find a realistic application for Zirconium or whatever. I don't think it's unreasonable to replace the roles of these things with fantasy materials that do actually have applications in universe. They don't all have to be an upgrade over steel every time. There's nothing wrong with mithril or adamantium of course, but if you added 10 tiers of that it would definitely get boring. You should add rocks that have reversed gravity, or glow metal, or something.

Really, it's just about fleshing out the resources of the underground and making the setting interesting. I want cool shit in my world.

>>96879104

>Obviously, with the tech level of a classic fantasy setting, you'd be hard pressed to find a realistic application for Zirconium or whatever.

Real problem is how to GET those metals. Dwarves would make use for titanium and funnily enough I think it's not even absurd to imagine them working it, but with high medieval tech you're not gonna have titanium tetrachloride at hand to produce the metal itself form ilmenite.

I don't think without magic or whatever you can really expand much the classical preindustrial metal extraction/refination processes.

I just thought of an interesting idea for a winged species' culture.

One kind of penance is basically a trial where the individual must climb a mountain (or maybe some other feat that would be trivial with flying)...without flying!

>>96882567
>One kind of penance is basically a trial where the individual must climb a mountain (or maybe some other feat that would be trivial with flying)...without flying!
What would warrant such a punishment?

>>96878329
no wonder you guys suck at this