Resources for WorldBuilding

[victusinveritas]

[summerdragoness]

I mean if it works, it works!

[spanishskulduggery]

So, guys, probably more reliable than Google Translate is in many cases there’s Linguee.

Linguee is a sort of dictionary filled with examples and sentences from all over the internet so you can look up individual phrases or words and see how they’re used and in what contexts.

So if you want to type in an actual phrase or something in English or Spanish (or a different language if you pick it) you can see your words used in sentences and see how actual sentences look… rather than relying on Google Translate to mess up the grammar or false cognates.

And more than that, you can also check the sources they take the example sentences from.

I highly recommend Linguee for people who are trying to figure out specific phrases rather than particular words (which I would use WordReference for).

[glossikos-blog]

Linguee is a god send!

[polyglottalstop]

Linguee is bomb!

[linguisticsblr]

My French teacher introduced me to Linguee and it really is spectacular!

[jamaicanblackcastoroil]

latinagabi

[latinagabi]

I’ve used sometimes for work translations, it’s pretty great!

[kiriamaya]

Oh cool! I should check this out!

[macaedh]

what the fuck ethan

[kvothbloodless]

I wish i had a context for this. But I really dont.

[pervocracy]

I was all ready to “um, actually” this, but, um, actually there’s about 3-4 grams of iron in a person, which x400 is 1.2-1.6kg, which is a smallish but not unreasonable sword. So. Math checks out.

[maxknightley]

How would you extract the iron, though? The more practical solution would be to kill a mere hundred men, then mix 1 part blood with 3 parts standard molten iron, imo. Cheaper and faster, while still retaining the edge that only evil magic can give you.

[bemusedlybespectacled]

Or, you could just make the sword of iron, and then use the blood to temper the blade.

[squeeful]

1.2 to 1.6 kilograms is a perfectly reasonable large sword.  Your average longsword was 1.1–1.8 kg and I don’t even remember if that’s including the weight of the hilt, guard, and pommel or just the blade.  Your more classic “knight sword” was a mere 1.1 kilograms on average; the blood of 400 men is more than enough.

This is using the comparatively crappy metallurgy of medieval Europe and their meh iron swords.  Move east to, say, contemporary Iran and make a scimitar using high carbon steel (~2%) for a .75 kilogram blade and you only need the blood of about 225 men.

[optimysticals]

So putting my thoughts in on this… because how could I not.

So you’ve exsanguinated your 400 guys to get the iron for your sword. Cool. But now you have 400 bodies lying around.

Why not put those to good use and cremate them. Use the carbon from those 400 bodies (you won’t need all of them) and now you can make a nice mid-high carbon steel sword.

Now you have a sword forged with the blood of your enemies AND strengthened with their bones.

[hedwig-dordt]

“high fantasy math” - the tag I should have expected to write some day.

[themarysue]

I’m so proud of everyone in this post

[1000storyideas]

How to create romantic couples with chemistry

Writing couples is both enchanting and exhausting. How do you make people ship your couple? How do you make them an OTP? How do you make your couple matter to the story? Or matter at all? To answer all these questions, I’ll explain three major must-have characteristics for couples:

1. Realism

Falling in love is a slow process. It’s different from person to person. People are flawed. Relationships are flawed. People make mistakes. People fear rejection. Not everyone will find their soulmate exactly when they need most. People show love in different ways. People are not flirty all the time. Realism is important. Development is essential. When writing a couple, visualize yourself as one of the characters (or both). Imagine their love story as if it was happening to you in real life. See how different it goes? Maybe not as fast and a thousand times clumsier, but also charming and interesting.

Example of strong realism: Carl and Ellie (UP), they take a lifetime to mature their love and mutual respect. Neither are perfect. The relationship goes through bad times, but their love only grows.

Originally posted by disneypixar

Example of weak realism: Caine and Jupiter (Jupiter Ascending), they fall in love in two or three days, not enough scenes are dedicated to developing the relationship. In the end, it feels strange. 

Originally posted by vampkhaleesi

2. Balance

Give your couple opposite but complementary features. This is basically the Yin-yang symbolism that a lot of stories shows. If one character is all love-and-peaceful, maybe the other is a furnace of anger. If one traveled the whole world, maybe the other never left their village. If one is a millionaire, maybe the other is homeless. If one is short with dark hair, maybe the other is tall with light hair. However, no matter how opposite they are, always keep the balance. One shouldn’t overshadow the other. They must shine together, but also as individuals.

Example of strong balance: Fix-it Felix Jr. and Sargent Calhoun (Wreck-It Ralph), they belong to different worlds, they would probably never meet. He is a sweet pie that always tries his best, a peacemaker. She is, on the other hand, an explosion, a warrior. They are both relevant in achieving victory. Also, both are the heroes of their own games.

Originally posted by 100-yardstare

Example of weak balance: Sasuke and Sakura (Naruto), he is way more powerful than her, he doesn’t respect her as a ninja, he doesn’t like working with her. He tried killing her more than once and was never sorry about that. She accepts being overshadowed. She lacks character development compared to Sasuke. There is no opposite-complementary features tying them. It’s unbalanced.

Originally posted by fuck-yea-naruhina-and-sasusaku

3. Synergy

Make them work together. Make them accomplish common goals. Make them a power duo. Make them laugh of the same jokes. Make it easy and natural for them to be together, talking, sharing and having a good time. Make their conversations flow. Make it easy to touch, and stare, and embrace, and kiss. Make their mind and body work together.

Example of strong synergy: Cat Noir and Ladybug/Adrien and Marinette (Miraculous Ladybug), they are the heroes of Paris. No, they are partners in saving the world. It doesn’t feel uncomfortable when they interact, fight and save each other. It feels right. It feels natural. You crave for interactions.

Originally posted by miraculousgifs

Example of weak synergy: Kim Tan and Eun-Sang (The Heirs), they are the type of couple that are always fighting, but sometimes indulge in a passionate kiss. However, there’s no synergy between these characters. They are never on the same page. They are never partners. The magic of their relationship never sparkles. Even their kisses are uncomfortable to watch.

Originally posted by shoujo-no-sekai

Now, think of your favorite couples (even non-canon ones) and try spotting the realism, the balance and the synergy in them. If you ship it,I’m pretty sure it’s there. 

Try applying these characteristics to your next writing.

[writersrandomramblings]

Overlooked.

[bonnettbee]

THANK YOU

[bonesnail]

AKA Why most fantasy cities would smell Terrible

[to-write-my-book-deactivated201]

Super easy world creator!

I was looking for an easy map creator that makes beautiful maps for a while now to make a visually stunning map to go along with my book. And now, after such a long search i have finally found one that suits my needs! Because i like it so much, i thought i’d share it with you guys! Just go to inkarnate.com and start creating! I have to warn you though, it is still in beta so a lot still needs to be added, but already it looks great and is easy to use!

I mean just look how beautiful some of these maps are!

And it is so much fun too! Someone even created a game of thrones map that is simply amazing!

So check it out and start creating your visual aid for your story. I promise you, it really is super easy and you will make one in no time!

You can find the site here: inkarnate

[gravehelm-deactivated20190202]

@noc-tua

[friendlyfrankenstein]

dear fiction writers: 

as far as I know, there is no large carnivore who would abandon actively eating a killed meal to chase live prey. chasing and hunting live prey is a risk, as a healthy live creature has the capability to injure a carnivore, or tire it out through the chase. If there is, say, a giant pile of dead bodies to eat, which abandoning would allow other carnivores or scavengers to steal and eat instead, it makes no sense at all. 

please stop doing that thing

[wallycaine]

The sole exception I can think of is if the large carnivore thought the live prey was another carnivore or scavenger, and was chasing them as a threat display to ensure they didn’t steal the dead bodies. Even in that case, though, it would only be a short, mock charge followed by returning to the pile if the opponent fled. With possibly whatever the animal’s equivalent of “and stay out” would be. 

[roachpatrol]

Another thing: most carnivores don’t like to fight. They have to mug something to death for every single meal, they have to stay in top shape while conserving their energy. Meanwhile, herbivores have plenty of extra energy because they eat stuff that comes out of the ground and doesn’t fight back, and they often live in big social groups, so they’re better at handling stress and more used to having to actually come to blows with other animals to get their way. 

So like, a zebra will try kick your ass just to see what’s up. A tiger won’t do shit unless it’s damn sure it can take you. I’d rather come face to face with a cougar than a stag— have you seen videos of what happens to hunters when a stag catches a dude on the ground? the stag tears the dude apart. Not even to eat him. Just because the stag didn’t like what was going on and decided it was time to curb stomp a motherfucker. 

So if you’re deciding what kind of Big Scary Animals to have be a threat, like, forget wolves and lions and eagles and velociraptors. Go drop in a moose.

[kaldurcalm-deactivated20240513]

This is why loud noise can scare bears away. It’s a threat display that normally convinces them that the charge isn’t worth the effort.

[fuckyeahcharacterdevelopment]

-Exception:  

If a carnivore is Not That Hungry it might drop something dead to chase something that is doing Extreme Prey Behavior– but it’s not going to be serious about it. I’m thinking of things like a domestic cat that chases birds and mice for kicks. Honestly, I think that the t rex in Jurassic Park was a good example of predator behavior– she abandons something difficult (like the kids in the jeep) for the bright shiny thing she has been conditioned to understand means food (tightpants math guy with the flare + gruff dino man with flare). For the rest of the film, she chases things that run, and then quits and chows down once she has something. This has been one of my biggest beefs with the later JP films, especially Jurassic World– rather than the scares coming from being treated and stalked like prey by animals, the scares are based on monsters killing and eating randomly. (And what’s with the treatment of all the herbivores as good and gentle? Herbivores will fuck you up because they got scared or because you pissed them off and those are the two primary emotions of large herbivores– they won’t eat you, but they’ll still trample you).

+Addition: The predators that aren’t snipers (like cougars or herons) tend to test individuals in a herd– they want to gauge your health and willingness to fuck somebody up before they commit to you as a target. If you stare them down with your cold dead eyes and gear up to wreck their shit they’ll piss off unless they’re completely desperate. (Like I said, the main emotions of prey animals are Time To Fuck Shit Up and Time To Run).  So, I’m desperately tired of all these people running and screaming away from wolves and velociraptors and bears oh my. 

Consider:

How much scarier fiction could be if predators acted like actual predators that can be intelligent and patient and are pressing around the edges of your party to find weakness and fear. 

[the-library-and-step-on-it]

It is said that, during the fantasy book in the late eighties, publishers would maybe get a box containing two or three runic alphabets, four maps of the major areas covered by the sweep of the narrative, a pronunciation guide to the names of the main characters and, at the bottom of the box, the manuscript. Please… there is no need to go that far. There is a term that readers have been known to apply to fantasy that is sometimes an unquestioning echo of better work gone before, with a static society, conveniently ugly ‘bad’ races, magic that works like electricity and horses that work like cars. It’s EFP, or Extruded Fantasy Product. It can be recognized by the fact that you can’t tell it apart form all the other EFP. Do not write it, and try not to read it. Read widely outside the genre. Read about the Old West (a fantasy in itself) or Georgian London or how Nelson’s navy was victualled or the history of alchemy or clock-making or the mail coach system. Read with the mindset of a carpenter looking at trees. Apply logic in places where it wasn’t intended to exist. If assured that the Queen of the Fairies has a necklace made of broken promises, ask yourself what it looks like. If there is magic, where does it come from? Why isn’t everyone using it? What rules will you have to give it to allow some tension in your story? How does society operate? Where does the food come from? You need to know how your world works. I can’t stress that last point enough. Fantasy works best when you take it seriously (it can also become a lot funnier, but that’s another story). Taking it seriously means that there must be rules. If anything can happen, then there is no real suspense. You are allowed to make pigs fly, but you must take into account the depredations on the local bird life and the need for people in heavily over-flown areas to carry stout umbrellas at all times. Joking aside, that sort of thinking is the motor that has kept the Discworld series moving for twenty-two years.

“Notes from a Successful Fantasy Author: Keep It Real” (2007), Terry Pratchett. (via the-library-and-step-on-it)

[thebluebird]

[fictionwritingtips]

thebluebird:

A professional script reader read 300 screenplays for five different studios, all the while tracking the many recurring problems. The infographic he made with the collected data offers a glimpse at where screenwriting goes wrong.

[xekstrin]

pay attention to this

this is important even if you don’t write scripts

[mumblingsage]

This is exceedingly important to all storytellers

[ijustreallylovedaredevil]

Looking for a random cause of death for a character? Click here.

Looking for a random city? Click here.

Looking for a random city that people have actually heard of? Click here.

Need a random surname for a character? Click here. (They also give prevalence by race, which is very helpful.)

Helpful writing tips for my friends.

[imtootiredtothinkofaname]

smallirishpotato

[nyokoko]

OH SHIT.

[justdrinktea]

A couple more resources I have open constantly:

Random motivations for your characters here!

Need some character quirks? Here and here! 

Having trouble with backstory? Here! (They have an option for fortunate and unfortunate backstories)

[writeworld-blog]

A Way With Worlds - World Creation Column 

This is a list of all columns, in chronological order.

Your Main Character - Why your setting is your main character.

It’s The Little Things That Count - What you need to know to build a good world.

IN THE BEGINNING … there was a lot of planning - Origins of worlds.

Intelligent Life and Culture - Who’s in your setting?

Magic and Technology - They may work different, but setting-wise they’re the same thing, and important.

Pyramids of Power - Influence, action, and effect in your world.

Getting a Vision - The warm-and-fuzzy issue of getting a feel for your world.

Your World Is In Danger! - The importance of preserving data in worldbuilding

Retcon as Continuity - Turning screw-ups into actual plots.

The Fanfic Rebellion - Why fanfic sometimes takes odd turns, and what you can learn from it.

Attitude - Except in some cases, the concept of ‘attitude’ can give you a bad one.

Finding Inspiration - When you need ideas.

Webbing your World #1 - A crash course in web development (somewhat dated) for putting your world and works on the web.

Webbing Your World #2: Getting fancy and getting involved - Going beyond simple pages (somewhat dated)

Webbing your World #3: What goes into your webbed world - Good page design and philosophy.

Writing Religion in your Continuity - Writing religion in a way that works.

Webbing Your World #4: The Revenge of Whoever - By popular request, a column on making your web world’s design work for visitors.

Getting Readership for your Continuity - The evils of pandering.

Readership on your terms - Getting readers for your world.

Creating New Religions - Spirituality from scratch.

Timeline-Based Writing - Using timelines for inspiration and story writing. Worth reading.

Yin and Yang; Utopia Dystopia Cornucopia - Absolute good, absolute evil, absolute writing nightmare.

Sex: A completely boring discussion - Writing from biology to society.

Putting it All Together: Xai - My own experiences in worldbuilding.

World View: Evolving with Alicia Ashby - Taking a simple anime and making something new without changing it.

Yin and Yang: The Deadly Hero - Killer heroes, stereotypes, and bad writing

Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed - The largely illusory quest for originality.

The Paradox of the Badass - Tough characters can be tough to write.

The Stakes - Know who’s fighting for what and why.

The Persecution Rests - Bigotry, biases, persecution - and how to write them.

Service, Service - What’s worse than Fanservice? Find out!

Crime and Punishment - Crime, law, punishment - and a step-by step way to review these elements and address issues.

More Crime and Punishment - Odds and ends on crime and punishment

Yin and Yang: Self-Serving Self-Sacrifice - It’ isn’t self-sacrifice if you do it for yourself.

Timeline based Writing: The Critical Axis - Further expanding on the Timeline-Based Writing column, looking at ways to find coherent storylines when you can’t seem to.

Why Are We Doing This? - The first anniversary column of Way With Worlds, and an introspective look at creativity.

Cycles of Conflict - A little psychology applied to writing conflicts, and exploring using a specific theory in your stories.

Losing The Race - Making your own races can lead to creating stereotypes if you aren’t careful.

Yin and Yang: Knowledge and Ignorance - Sometimes it’s what your character’s don’t know that’s important.

Yin and Yang: Subjectivity and Objectivity - You know what you know - or do you? And what do your characters really know?

The Odds - Just what are the chances of things happening in your world?

Normalcy - Just what is normal in your world - and just what is normal, period?

The March - History is happening as you write, not just when you build your world.

God, Darwin, History - Avoid the three biggest excuses in writing and life.

Parallel Earths - Alternate Earths require subtlety they don’t always receive.

Technology and Terminology - Beware Technobabble! A look at how characters refer to technology.

Communicating your World - Just because you built it doesn’t mean readers will understand it.

Playing God - A great way to make your work less than divine.

Without Words - There’s more to communications than just things your characters say.

TMI - You may have a world, but writing about it the wrong way can negatively affect your readers.

The Drought - Your readers need to know what’s going on - don’t disappoint them.

Aslan Meets His Match: Theme versus Setting - A look at the idea of new Narnia chapters, and what it can tell us about worlds and story themes.

Dark Mary Sue - There’s something worse than a heroic Mary Sue - a Mary Sue villain.

The Realism Factor - Reality is a two-sided process - or is it one?

Apocalypse How - It’s the end of the world, and amrageddon is a lot of work.

And In Closing - Way With Worlds draws to an end.

[yutaan]

ooooh~

[silvokrent]

Source.

[popchartlab]

Who the Hell Is This Person Talking to Me and How Exactly Are They Related to Me: The Chart, just in time for your Thanksgiving gathering.

(Source: Apparently commenter “Platypus Man” from this Lifehacker post)

[genealogy-watercooler]

Oooh!  I really like that this chart gives (average) percentage of genetic similarity.

And confession: Despite my genealogy hobby, I can never remember what my cousins’ children are called in relation to me.  (First cousin once removed, apparently.) 

[madlori]

Protip: the 1st, 2nd, 3rd etc when referring to cousins refers to how many generations back you have to go to find a common grandparent. First cousins share a grandparent, second cousins share a great-grandparent, etc.

If you do NOT share a grandparent with the relative (for example, your grandparent is their great-grandparent) then there’s a remove involved.

[ganymedesclock]

Y’know what would be a cool idea? Taking the commonly-accepted fantasy races and swapping around their domains and associations. Just to shake things up a bit.

Elves as subterranean builders and miners, spindly and pale from the lack of sunlight and with a highly developed sense of hearing, even to the point of echolocation, to get around in places with zero light. Talented craftsmen with small, precise fingers, masters of prosthetic technology because it’s all too easy for a delicate limb to get snagged in machinery or crushed in a cave-in.

Dwarves that are mountain and alpine-forest dwelling herdsmen, sturdy against the extreme climate. They pride themselves on the understanding that they know what’s important and are some of the best cavalry around- even able to tame and forge agreements with the big cats that wander the area. With solid legs and powerful shoulders from running up slopes or rappelling down them after stray lambs. Lowland dwarves that are seafarers, as surefooted on the rigging of a tossing ship as their mountain cousins are on the slopes.

Goblins and orcs that are city-builders and empire-makers, architects that build walled citadels and metropolises, the diplomats that pull the other races together and reap the profits in the form of the most trade agreements. Building roads to link settlements together and guarding them with rigorously trained and well-outfitted soldiers. Wealthy orc merchants who flaunt status with painstakingly etched tusks, inlaid with gold or precious minerals.

[ferret-on-pancakes]

How to Design a Town Map - Fantastic Maps

Creating city maps can be hard. Here's four quick steps I use to design believable town and city maps.

I found this very useful. Sometimes it’s great to have a visual aid of the layout of the settlements, towns or cities where your stories develop. It’s good to have an idea of the distance between places and their position within the town; this way, it might be easier to describe the routes your characters travel, noting buildings that might be relevant to the story later or relating other characters to certain areas of a city.

[baenling]

@darkamoeba

[lutra-panchi]

A Note on Magical Word Structure

While scanning through a lot of magic posts on tumblr, I’ve seen a lot of tags misusing suffixes. In particular “-mancy” gets used as a general term for magic works, I guess because it just sounds mystical in nature. As someone deeply in love with facts and the English language, such misappropriations van be a little off putting. With one simple search, it would be immediately and obviously revealed that -mancy specifically refers to forms of divination; i.e. cartomancy, the use of cards in divination.

The obvious exception is of course, ‘necromancy’. The term actual literally means ‘conferring with the dead as a mean to divine answers’, but modern media has bastardized the word into encompassing a strange hodgepodge of dark arts involving corspes. This is wholey inaccurate, and probably is the single reason for that abuse of -mancy. However, the fact that we study eclectic wisdom not typically included in modern academia, is no excuse to abandon higher study practices and formal education. And so, I present a brief list of suffixes and how they can and are applied to magic.

-Mancy: A form of divination.

(CRYSTALLOMANCY: Divination by crystal gazing.)

-Graphy: Writing or feild of study.

(TASSEOGRAPHY: Study of tea leaves)

-Tion: Action of.

(INCANTATION: Act of chanting.)

-Ology: Study of.

(NUMEROLOGY: Study of numbers.)

-Ism: Practice or system of.

(MYSTICISM: Practising mystic arts.)

-Ry: Occupation of.

(PALMISTRY: Work of reading palms.)

-Ic: Having characteristics of.

-Scopy/Scope: Examination of.

(HOROSCOPE: Examination of a time.)

-Sis: Action, state, condition, or process of.

(TELEKINESIS: Process of long distance psychic interaction.)

-Magy: A form of magic.

The suffix -Magy would be a much more logical end to a custom word describing a practice of magic, and far better than the overused -mancy. For instance, magic with technology would become ‘technomagy’. Magic involving thoughtforns would become ‘tulpamagy’. It’s a slight change in spelling and pronunciation, but a huge shift in meaning.

I hope this will clear up some confusion on not only naming of magic practises, but also understanding the meaning of names of existing practices. As always, I’ll update this post as I find more useful ideas, and I’ll probably also make an extensive list of magic related studies and words for reference purposes.

[fixyourwritinghabits]

Plot A Month W1D5: The Antagonist

TRUE STORY TIME: I’ve been working on the novel I’m writing now for three years. Part of the problem is that I scrapped the plot and reworked it because I didn’t have a middle. Another part of the problem is that I didn’t have an antagonist either; things happened, but I didn’t know who was behind them or why.

There is no requirement to have an actual person be an antagonist, but there are very real reasons you need your story to have something consistently opposing the main character. Theses reasons are:

Goals need obstacles. In order to maintain your story through the middle slog, you need to have something to prevent the main character from getting what they want. The reason why most people go for an actual villain is because they’re easier to use for this purpose. However, your antagonist can be ‘nature’ if your character is lost in the woods. It can be that change in weather, the bear, the misleading deer path. Something has to stand in the way of your character getting what they want.

Tension needs to rise. You need to raise the stakes throughout the story. The character’s situation needs to get worse before it gets better. Something the characters fears or has to fight is a great way to do that.

Something needs to stand in the way of change. Internally and externally, things have to change for your character. This is why series often lose steam; the character stops changing. In order to accomplish this, you need to find that thing that will prevent the character from changing; what will stop Katniss from going home (being killed in the Hunger Games), what will stop the boy wizard (Voldemort).

While your antagonist is usually going to be a person, they don’t necessarily need to be a bad person either - a husband becomes an antagonist during a divorce, a well-meaning teacher is a student’s bane, a mom becomes an enemy over a date. Not all antagonists mean to be antagonists. Don’t get me wrong - villains are easy to use and well-liked because they’re able to provide clear plot conflict and character motivation. There’s nothing wrong with using villains, either, but like the other characters, they need to be complex, not flat.

If you have your antagonist, break out your character worksheets and starting filling them in. If you don’t, look at your character’s goals/conflicts and figure out who (or what!) will stand in their way. The middle of a story is a slog to write through; the way to do it is to raise the stakes for the MC, and make their goals harder to achieve. Find what does that.

See Also:

Guide to Writing a Villain

Fictional Exercises for Creating Villains

How to Write Better Villains

Likeable Villains

How to Make a Scary Villain

A Masterpost on Writing Antagonists, Antiheroes, and Villains