SFFworldia: world building project - The absolute basics.

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Originally Posted by Andols

thats a great name, nice one. how far into technology do we want the panmortians to go?

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My own preference would be as low tech as possible; long distance communication by telegraph lines/morse code, a network of small gage railroads with steam powered locomotives, river commerce by paddle-wheel/sail steamers, and perhaps very fragile glider type flyers powered by a sputtering internal combustion engine... everything would be first generation, unreliable and not very pretty.

For the most part Panmortium would still be an agrarian society, with all the superstitions/ignorance and charm one would expect. I guess if you imagined America between 1800-1850 that would be similar.

Again, this is just my own preference I'll toss out there; I think it might be cool if we stayed clear of English themed Magic/Steampunk and went for a more neoclassical look, sort of like stepping back to Classical Antiquity and lending them some industrial know-how.
After all, most of our Western Culture, including Christianity, are built on Greek philosophy and ideals. Our modern approach to science and discovery is rooted in Hellenistic advancements.

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Originally Posted by Sparrow

Again, this is just my own preference I'll toss out there; I think it might be cool if we stayed clear of English themed Magic/Steampunk and went for a more neoclassical look, sort of like stepping back to Classical Antiquity and lending them some industrial know-how.
After all, most of our Western Culture, including Christianity, are built on Greek philosophy and ideals. Our modern approach to science and discovery is rooted in Hellenistic advancements.

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Sounds like Greece as it might have been had craftsmen been a valued part of the culture. After all they developed the steam engine millenia before Fulton made it practical. The Greeks considered the device just a toy and not a very interesting one.

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Originally Posted by mylinar

Sounds like Greece as it might have been had craftsmen been a valued part of the culture. After all they developed the steam engine millenia before Fulton made it practical. The Greeks considered the device just a toy and not a very interesting one.

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Any culture that invents the first vending machine has my respect.
So next time we slip a buck and a quarter to get a bottled water, remember, some ancient Greeks were doing it long before us... except it was 'holy water' at religious temples.

And you're right, the Greeks had the wrong mindset for developing inventions to a higher form. It's one of the many problems when slave labor is readily available, no need to industrialize when labor is almost free.

There could be an interesting dynamic between the people of Panmortia and Arvelon because while the overall cultures are tech and magic that does not mean everyone in each culture is that way.

In Arvelon there are sure to be some people who are just not capable of doing magic, but who are very inventive craftspeople with a bent towards science. Similarly in Panmortia there are people who would be attracted to the study of magic for occult/religious/spiritual reasons and some would certainly have some ability to do so.

Investigating these people who run counter to their own culture and how the chafe against their society (and how said society chafes back) would be an interesting thing to explore.

Unless we want to create some 'mechanism' that prevents this cross pollination but I would be against such a dues ex machina.

it makes complete sense that there would be sympathizers and even pracitioners of the other cultures within the opposite borders.

Although we're moving a bit slower now thatn previously, i think we're making good progress. I suggest we start busting out our MS paint renditions of the geography soon :)

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Originally Posted by Andols

it makes complete sense that there would be sympathizers and even pracitioners of the other cultures within the opposite borders.

Although we're moving a bit slower now thatn previously, i think we're making good progress. I suggest we start busting out our MS paint renditions of the geography soon :)

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Any Artist in the group?

We could always use the WorldBuilder functionality embbedded in Civilization IV. It would probably do the trick and is not that hard to use. Of course you have to own Civilization IV, or III, or II or I :)

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Originally Posted by Andols

Although we're moving a bit slower now thatn previously, i think we're making good progress. I suggest we start busting out our MS paint renditions of the geography soon :)

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I suggest you use Inkscape instead. It creates Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) files. The nice thing about them is that you can scale them, that is, zoom in and out without the pixels becoming blocks. Inkscape is free and not much more difficult to use than MS Paint. And it's available for all platforms: Windows, OS X, and Linux.

PS: I forgot to add the manual.

I'm more of a plot driven/dialogue person then a description person so I might watch and learn for ye all about mapping out civilizations. When we start character building I will be more useful...lol.

When it came to the civilizations in my book(s) I was lucky...I dreamt it first. lmao.

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Originally Posted by mylinar

We could always use the WorldBuilder functionality embbedded in Civilization IV. It would probably do the trick and is not that hard to use. Of course you have to own Civilization IV, or III, or II or I :)

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I own call the civs. including a pre-order of 5 :)

I like the idea of using paint or inkscape rendering and tinkering with them as a group though.

I create a thread in the discussion group on geography, for those of you who are interested.

Not letting this die!


Anyone attempt a geography rendition? I think once we get that settled and roll out a nice outline we might be getting close to a useable world.

I would say just move onto an outline. I would start with scene build up. Paint a picture with words of the worlds these two cultures live in.

Then choose goals, conflicts, and what they truly want.

Map out 5 main characters on both worlds. (good and evil characters)
Do character descriptions using individual goals and what they truly see as what they want for themselves and their civilizations.

Anyway that's where I would start.

Kind of a shame that this endevor died.

Ya just need someone to take the helm. :)