Speaking of Ethangea...
Feb. 28th, 2002 11:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_gneechThis world-building stuff is hard work. It's a big task, and I'm not sure if I'm going about it the right way. Should I keep going with this "big picture" approach, or should I narrow in on a small region? I have a bunch of city, town, and place names ... should I just scatter them liberally around the map and start sketching things in around them?
I had in mind to start writing up little vignettes about different areas of the world ... just little bits of local folklore, historical info, etc. Nothing big, just tidbits, such as:
"The Three Bells Tavern: This small tavern in the seaside village of Sephyr was originally a temple of the Church of the Gold Dragon, and still has three bells in a tower. When the larger temple was built at the other end of town, the temple was sold to its current owner to help pay for the costs of building the new one. The owner, Shiarr, is a dark-furred ka of western descent, was a fighting sailor in the Vesperian navy until a crossbow bolt hit his spine, drastically reducing his mobility. He cooks almost all the food the tavern serves according to his own tastes -- that is to say, with WAY too much pepper."
...or...
"Four hundred years ago, the 'Battle of 20,000' took place in the river valley. Local tradition holds that so many were slain that their blood turned the river red for two days ... giving the River of 20,000 Ghosts its distinctive name."
...etc.
But there is so much world there, that it would take years to do that everywhere. I need to pick and choose.
It's kind of a strange catch-22 ... I need a world to put my stories in ... but I need stories to know what parts of the world are important.
A lot of popular fantasy worlds are created around a premise ... how magic works, or the nature of some god, that kind of thing. Unfortunately, that's always been something that I have difficulty with. In Ethangea, I have the premise of the dragons as demigods, giving way to the sphinxes as tyrants, leading to the cataclysm and the muting of magic ... and the Drowned God acting as a wildcard throughout it all.
Maybe I'll just start with doing a small area in detail (Vesperia is a good candidate), write a few short stories there, and see what develops. As other parts of the world become important (Who do they trade with? Who are their enemies? Who are their allies? What's the dominant religion?) I'll make notes on them as well.
Some guiding principles, stolen from various sources and thought up out of my own heat-oppres'd brain:
-The Gneech
I had in mind to start writing up little vignettes about different areas of the world ... just little bits of local folklore, historical info, etc. Nothing big, just tidbits, such as:
"The Three Bells Tavern: This small tavern in the seaside village of Sephyr was originally a temple of the Church of the Gold Dragon, and still has three bells in a tower. When the larger temple was built at the other end of town, the temple was sold to its current owner to help pay for the costs of building the new one. The owner, Shiarr, is a dark-furred ka of western descent, was a fighting sailor in the Vesperian navy until a crossbow bolt hit his spine, drastically reducing his mobility. He cooks almost all the food the tavern serves according to his own tastes -- that is to say, with WAY too much pepper."
...or...
"Four hundred years ago, the 'Battle of 20,000' took place in the river valley. Local tradition holds that so many were slain that their blood turned the river red for two days ... giving the River of 20,000 Ghosts its distinctive name."
...etc.
But there is so much world there, that it would take years to do that everywhere. I need to pick and choose.
It's kind of a strange catch-22 ... I need a world to put my stories in ... but I need stories to know what parts of the world are important.
A lot of popular fantasy worlds are created around a premise ... how magic works, or the nature of some god, that kind of thing. Unfortunately, that's always been something that I have difficulty with. In Ethangea, I have the premise of the dragons as demigods, giving way to the sphinxes as tyrants, leading to the cataclysm and the muting of magic ... and the Drowned God acting as a wildcard throughout it all.
Maybe I'll just start with doing a small area in detail (Vesperia is a good candidate), write a few short stories there, and see what develops. As other parts of the world become important (Who do they trade with? Who are their enemies? Who are their allies? What's the dominant religion?) I'll make notes on them as well.
Some guiding principles, stolen from various sources and thought up out of my own heat-oppres'd brain:
- Never force yourself to create more than you must.
- When you create an important person, place, thing, or event, always devise at least one secret related to that piece.
- Most people are born, live, and die within a 50-mile radius of their home.
- An army travels on its stomach.
- 10% of people are always honest. 10% of people are always dishonest. The rest ... are temptable.
- People always want to believe the best about their leaders. They also always want to believe the worst.
- Good stories challenge the characters.
- Don't be afraid to hurt your characters.
- Powerful foes make great heroes. Weak foes cheapen heroes.
- Adopt, adapt, and improve. (Also known as "Steal and change.")
- Evil has an agenda. So does good. And so does everyone else.
- Happy people don't make history.
-The Gneech
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
The Gneech's rules as applied to real life...
I live more than 50 miles from where I was born.
I eat a lot.
I strive to be in the honest 10%.
I have powerful foes.
Some of the best things people believe about me are true -- and so are some of the worst.
But -- but -- I'm happy! And that means I am doomed to never make history. ;)
Ah, well...
A nice compilation, none the less. It has gone into my "brain".
Hey, Gneech! If you aren't familiar with "The Brain", check it out! I've used it for a few years now. The download is free at "TheBrain.com" -- and if you decide to keep it, it is $50.
It is an excellent idea organizer -- and as reliable as a rock despite all that Windows can do to software. Many thousands of entries, and not one lost piece of data.
It is unlike any database system I have ever seen, and I have seen many.
===|==============/ Level Head
Re: The Gneech's rules as applied to real life...
Date: 2002-03-01 05:59 am (UTC)Oh, no, wait, it's a different Brain. My bad! ;) -TG
Re: The Gneech's rules as applied to real life...
Date: 2002-03-01 08:10 pm (UTC)Yes, but travel is much more reasonable now than it was 1000 years ago, as is the typical setting for most fantasy worlds. Most medieval people never left their village (which is why the plague would miss entire villages at a time). To leave your village usually meant one of two things: death by starvation, or one would never find their way back. Either way, they ceased their citizenship in that village. Thus, very few ever lived more than even ten miles from where they were born. The main exception to this is the Crusaders, and travelling merchants, the latter of which there were very few until the 14th Century.