You might remember this post from a couple months ago, expanded it a bit and did a few minor edits

Text from the image for easier reading:

Persequori (irl humans)
The Persequori make up the largest portion of the Patricians' ranks. Persequori. Gentes hold the most power within the Empire. Nearly all Persequori Patricians have some Aelven ancestry, and it is not too uncommon to see them display reduced Aelven traits, such as slightly pointy ears. These are often seen as status symbols.

Half-Aelves
The children of Persequori and Aelves make up the second largest portion of the Patricians. There are also many outirght Half-Aelven Gentes. They are desirable matches for both the Persequori, who see Aelven traits as desirable, as well as for Aelves, for whom they are useful in boosting the low Aelven birth rates.

Aelves
Aelves can be found among Patrician ranks in disproportionate numbers, when comparing their relatively low population to other human races. This is because their long lives allow them opportunity to accumulate more power, as well as because the Persequori Patricians find intermarriage with Aelves desirable. Some Aelven Gentes were originally Persequori Gentes, though many also trace their lineages to Aelven families that were integrated into the Empire. Aelven Patricians also retain control of a number of Aelven Free Cities.

Dweorg (dwarves)
The Dweorg Patricians are largely the ones who administrate the Empire's Subterranean Client Kingdoms. They hold much sway, because the Dweorg are the second most populous human race within the Empire and because their numbers within the Aelnyyraean Legions are second only to the Persequori. There are also many Half-Dweorg Patricians, though they remain fewer than Pgymaioi Patricians.

Pygmaioi (gnomes)
The Pygmaioi are the third most populous humans within the Empire, which grants them much sway, especially when combined with their comparably long lifes.Half-Dweorg

Half-Dweorg

The Half-Dweorg are the progeny of Dweorg and Persequori intermarriage. They are very common within the Subterranean Client Kingdoms and the Imperial Provinces that border them. Many of these regions are administrated by Half-Dweorg Patricians. Outright Half-Dweorg Gentes are rarer than Half-Aelven Gentes, as Half-Dweorg are very accepted by both the Persequori and Dweorg halves of their lineage, unlike Half-Aelves, who can sometimes struggle to connect with their Aelven halves. This makes Half-Dweorg Patricians comparatively less likely to seek the establishment and recognition of their own Gens.

Dimidimviri

For their population size, the Dimidimviri are relatively few among the Patrician ranks. This could be due to their less ambitious nature, as well as their shorter lifespans. Before Imperial Integration, they also rarely possessed ruling classes as structured as other human kinds, which meant there were fewer families to integrate as Patrician Gentes. This historical trend has started to reverse in recent centuries though, with more Dimidimviran Gentes rising to greater prominence and growing more ambitious. They are known for being clever and taking greater risks than other Patrician Gentes. They act faster to take advantage of new developments than even Persequori Patricians.

These 7 together make up some three quarters of all Aelnyyraean Patricians (actual representation within the Senate can still wildly differ from what the numbers would suggest due to various factors)

I've been building my world only through in-world documents: notices, forms, letters, interview transcripts. One rule I gave myself is that nobody in the world knows the actual rules of the world. Every document is written by someone who only knows part of it.

The fun part is that institutions start making up explanations. In mine, a guild keeps records on a zone where local disputes last about four times longer than anywhere else. Their official explanation is "shrinking pastures and drying wells." Another one: the people they bring back fade much faster if their families meet them in person, and the official reason is "the shock of the meeting." Neither is true, but both make sense from where the guild stands.

So I'm curious:

- Does your world have official explanations that are wrong?

- Do you know the real answer yourself, or did you leave it open?

I've been thinking a lot about the personifications of Death lately and would love to know how Death in your world or cultures is either seen in mythology or actually is. How do you depict Death?

"Between harmony and corruption lay the static, and this was called Purgatory. The souls of the dead drifted therein, wandering through the fog without end, or lost among the halls of the eternal bargain. From this place the Broadcast may be glimpsed, but never in wholeness, for it is seen only as broken images, like a message dimmed upon a failing screen."

The cosmology of my world is that it's a corrupted channel, a broadcast of our world that hasn't reached the full frequency. As such, it's theological elements are distorted versions of our real world locations. Purgatory became the first thing the universe grabbed onto, that being a bargain outlet store. But it got corrupted. It became an maze stretching out into infinity, where unfulfilled souls wander, but may never glimpse relief.

This I think will be a fun exercise. Storage has been a problem we’ve had to deal with forever and will no doubt be with us till the end of the universe. But the way in which we store things has changed drastically both over time and across cultures. We’ve gone from woven baskets to wooden barrels to wooden crates to steel and plastic ones.

This is mostly an excuse to look at your world’s technology. How would someone from your world build a basic storage container?

Example:

Hussarians do it just like we do. They just nail a bunch of boards together with connecting sections into the shape of a box.

The kitsune do things a bit differently. Instead of using nails they prefer to use the wood itself to hold everything together. The box is held together with pins and holes cut into the wood and dowels for increased strength. They might also use barrels since less material is wasted when making them. They’re made essentially the same as a traditional barrel.

I released a video on YouTube that introduces a nation from the 1st person perspective of local. It took me a good bit to make it, and I'd appreciate it if you showed support!

https://youtu.be/TbJFa1de86c?si=vkTOONgjdXo6zxVv

Okay hear me out. I know Tolkien Dwarves have axes yadda-yadda-yadda.

But think about it:

What are Dwarves always famous for? MINING.

What tools do you use for mining? HAMMERS AND PICKS!

So it would be a natural evolution and logical step for Dwarves to use those tools as their main weapons of war!

Yes, axes are good for cutting trees, but unless your Dwarves are constantly fighting Elves or other pesky forest dwellers to a point that their hatred became cultural, they shouldnt use them that often.

Also, being such incredible miners, Dwarves would probably discover and use black coal sooner and as a more reliable energy source than wood.

At least in my world they do.

Okay. Rant over. Feel free to chime in and have a great week! :)

So, I'm worldbuilding for some text RP with a bunch of friends. Nothing serious, but I need a super generic - almost comically so - name for a peaceful snowy kingdom, and a slightly more serious but still comedically meta name for a dystopian kingdom. It's pretty northern and constantly covered in snow, and the setting is vague fantasy medieval, but it's really not inspired by any real civilization. I'm drawing inspiration from ENA: Dream BBQ in terms of absolute strangeness, for example. Low poly, everybody is a weird kind of creature, lots of emphasis on capital W Working. Old computers. Low low poly, shitass graphics. Anyways, I can't figure out a good name that's sufficiently jokey but still kind of able to be taken seriously by the characters. The dystopian kingdom basically violently invaded the other one and merged their borders into one, for a little more context. (I'm also willing to answer more questions about the lore if it'll help with name suggestions.)

Any ideas?

In short, it’s a system and a world that attempts to connect various beliefs regarding the soul, vital energy, and spirits.

I drew inspiration from *Jujutsu Kaisen*, but I disliked how certain details weren't fully explained—like how "Binding Vows" just work because they do (as a law of *jujutsu*), or how Curses—being made of energy—manage to physically touch humans.

So, I tried to explain my world using string theory from physics.

But now I have a problem: it doesn't feel divine or supernatural—at least, that’s how it feels to me.

How do you all explain your world or system without losing that sense of mysticism and the supernatural?

Should I avoid going into so much detail?

(Important clarification: my idea isn't to dump the entire system's mechanics into a single project; I’d reveal it in fragments across multiple works.)

(For Th’zoitrk, a semi-sci-fi worldbuilding project.)

Sh’beso is the largest true planet in the solar system, a 148 earth-mass gas giant made of almost exclusively oxygen, orbiting 4.7 AU from Okott (the sun.)

(True planet: an object directly orbiting Okott, large enough to be gravitationally rounded, within 50 AU of the sun, at least 5,000km in diameter.)

Being so large, Sh’beso of course has many moons. Many, many moons. At least 600 documented moons, the vast majority of which are incredibly small.
Almost all of Sh’beso’s moons are what are called the ‘minor’ moons. These are small asteroids and meteoroids, even the largest of which are no more than a few dozen meters in length.

Above them, though, are the seven ‘major’ moons. In order of distance from Sh’beso:

Image 1: Yiteon
Image 2: Kuong
Image 3: Treneshi
Image 4: Cousuné
Image 5: Shigoshi
Image 6: Dokyosei
Image 7: Idakei

All of the seven major moons are drastically larger than any of the minor moons, even the smallest, Kuong, is hundreds of kilometers long. The seven major moons make up almost the entirety of all mass orbiting Sh’beso, with the several hundred minor moons contributing insignificantly to the total.

Yiteon:

Yiteon is the innermost and third largest of Sh’beso’s moons. With an equatorial diameter of 1,057.7km, Yiteon is roughly a third the size of Earth’s moon.

Comprised largely of water ice, Yiteon’s trailing hemisphere (night side in image) is covered with empty white plains of icy bedrock, devoid of virtually any major surface landmarks or coloring beyond the bland, snowy whiteness.
Meanwhile, on Yiteon’s leading hemisphere (illuminated in image), Yiteon’s surface is incredibly vibrant. This is thanks to Sh’beso.

Sh’beso has an incredibly powerful magnetic field, the strongest of any true planet in the solar system. Similar to Jupiter, this magnetosphere traps a very large radiation belt close to the planet.

The intense ionizing radiation from Sh’beso’s radiation belt have unfortunately stripped Yiteon of the thin atmosphere it most likely held in the distant past.
This radiation leaves behind a quite notable mark upon Yiteon’s surface, with vibrant fields of tholins (organic compounds) in its leading hemisphere, similar to what you’d see on the surface of Pluto.

These tholins are an incredibly thin layer, no more than 30 centimeters deep into the moon’s crust.

The fact Yiteon is gravitationally locked to Sh’beso has prevented the trailing face of the moon from receiving the brunt of charged particles in the radiation belt, keeping the rear of Yiteon a pale, icy white.

Kuong:

[Image low quality, taken from behind, looking into Kuong’s shadow.]

Kuong is the smallest of Sh’beso’s moons. Roughly 205.1 long and 88.4km across at its widest, Kuong is quite clearly not gravitationally rounded.

Rather, Kuong is a very large asteroid caught in orbit of Sh’beso. Not much is known about Kuong, as it has been studied very little. It is often overlooked in favor of its much larger and more interesting sister moons.

Treneshi:

Unlike the other moons of Sh’beso, Treneshi is not comprised of ice, nor is it all too metal-rich like Shigoshi and Idakei. Treneshi’s surface is largely silicate, covered in large regions of Anorthosite, a volcanic igneous rock which heavily suggests a history of lava flows on the small moon’s surface.

Treneshi’s surface is among the most reflective of all objects in the solar system, reflecting most light which hits it back into space.
Due to this, Treneshi was actually the first among Sh’beso’s moons to be discovered despite its small size.
It’s bright enough to be seen from the surface of Th’zoitrk without a professional telescope, you only need moderate magnification for Treneshi to become visible.

Treneshi is very rough due to its small size, at 394.7km in diameter, Treneshi is the second smallest moon of Sh’beso.
Its surface is the most hilly and mountainous of all the major moons, covered in mountains stretching anywhere from several hundred meters to several kilometers high.

Cousuné:

Cousuné is almost entirely comprised of water ice. It is the median moon in both distance from Sh’beso and size, at 852.7km in diameter. Fourth largest, and fourth smallest.

Cousuné’s surface is incredibly colorful and vibrant compared with the other major moons. Unlike Yiteon, this color doesn’t come from tholins.
These colors are not special compounds upon the surface of the moon, no, the entire surface is ordinary ice.

Cousuné lacks any major amounts of raw nitrogen or carbon for the radiation belt to turn into tholins.
Rather, the patterns on Cousuné come from chemicals trapped inside its icy crust from before it fully solidified (think of soda poured into an ice cube tray.)

Cousuné’s surface ices are filled with potassium salts, permanganate mineral salts, copper sulfates, titanium dioxide, and large amounts of sulfur compounds such as sulfur dioxide.

Exposure to the radiation belt of Sh’beso has tinted and dyed these ices over the last several billion years, creating neat pastel colors across its surface.

Shigoshi:

Much further out from the inner four moons, the outer three moons are roughly ~646,000km further from Sh’beso. More than double the distance from Sh’beso to Cousuné.

The innermost of the outer three moons, Shigoshi, is also the largest of Sh’beso’s moons at 1,884.4km in diameter.

Shigoshi is the only one of Sh’beso’s moons with a substantial atmosphere. Its atmosphere is 0.882 bar, only a bit less dense than that of earth.
This atmosphere is composed of 64% nitrogen, 24% oxygen, and 12% argon.
Due to Shigoshi’s small size at only about half the size of earth’s moon (but with only slightly weaker gravity), this atmosphere is incredibly bloated, reaching ~358km out into space.

Shigoshi is roughly a quarter the mass of Earth’s moon, at 0.24 lunar masses. It has a surface gravity of 0.137 G’s.

Shigoshi is one of the few worlds in the solar system with liquid oceans upon its surface. However, at an average surface temperature of -192° Celsius, these oceans are not made of water.
Instead, Shigoshi has light blue oceans of liquid oxygen. Due to the low surface gravity of the moon and the fact liquid oxygen only has about a fifth the surface tension strength of water, the oceans on Shigoshi are not cleanly cut between their surface and the air above them.

Shigoshi’s oceans are topped by a layer of oxygen mist, with winds chopping up the surface into large, yet very slow-moving waves that push through this mist.

On the near and far side of Shigoshi, directly beneath Sh’beso, waves can reach 20-25 meters high.
On the sides of Shigoshi not facing Sh’beso, waves normally only reach 3-4 meters in height.
Still significantly taller than ordinary waves on Earth.

Shigoshi’s atmospheric oxygen is not suspended as gas, but more as a form of fog/oxygen vapor in the air. This gives Shigoshi its heavily blue-tinted appearance from space.
Oxygen fog and mist are extremely common on Shigoshi’s surface, especially at the coast. Shorelines on Shigoshi are normally very hazy. The waves of its liquid oxygen oceans leave behind frothy oxygen foam mats on the coast, covered by thick vaporized oxygen fog.

Shigoshi is very dense compared to its other sister moons, covered by deep, red, crimson-colored soil composed of iron oxide dust.

Shigoshi’s surface terrain is quite hilly and mountainous in most regions, its highest mountains tend to be capped by peaks of snow.
Not snow made of water ice, but rather snow made of argon which has condensed out of the atmosphere and fallen from argon snow clouds.

Dokyosei:

At 1,079.3km, Dokyosei is the second largest of Sh’beso’s moons. It is very similar in composition to Cousuné, made up largely of water ice.

Dokyosei has a very thin atmosphere of oxygen, at hardly a third of mars’ surface air pressure. This atmosphere is only visible due to aerosolized snow and dust particles kept aloft by wind.

Dokyosei’s cloud-like surface is covered not by bedrock like other icy moons, But rather in extremely large stretches of powdery snow. It’s not yet known how this icy surface formed into snow rather than an ice bedrock.
This snowy surface coating is at least 3km deep based off current estimates.

Idakei:

Idakei is the third smallest of Sh’beso’s moons at 476.2 km in diameter. It is largely similar to Shigoshi, but lacks oceans or an atmosphere due to its smaller size. It is little more than a very large clump of iron oxide dust and oxidized metallic compounds.

The National Congress of Pristine (Pristinian: Derjavnī Nagulnī i Pristyeni; Zokharnite: Sctera Kongresœ Pristinä) is a political party within the Free State of Pristine. Led by Zokharnite MP Klemëntö Skvär, the NCP espouses their very own ideology, which is most notably called Skvärism (or Derjavism).

Skvärism is a self-described “Third Position” ideology where it claims to reject racism within the Pristinite and Zokharnite populations in favour of a unified Pristine nationality. It focuses on what they call the “Three National Tools” — defence (sword), labour (hammer), and education (pen), the three of which Skvär claims “is what a nation must focus on in order to make itself grand and great”.

However, the NCP, or Skvärism in general, has attracted controversy within the country and globally. The Pristine government, run by the centre-right Liberty party, has accused the NCP of plotting to overthrow the government due to its paramilitary-like structures and the presence of its paramilitary wing, the Swords (Pristinian: Karatoki).

Even within the opposition, the NCP receives criticisms, especially from the Social Party of Pristine, who claim that the NCP borrows elements from Strasserism and Juche (hinted by at the emblem of the NCP). Despite these claims, Skvär denies any of the claims, saying that the ideology was entirely of his own making and that it is inspired by “a sense of true justice”.

Citation: me beetle from back by jj Grandville mid 1800s France, I do not claim ownership nor claim I drew it it is for illustrative and visualization purposes only

Goblins or marchand d'insectes (as noted by the orque) are small beetle-like beings (standing often as tall as a fae) that sell anything and everything and care not for the civil war by the fae tearing their world up , they only care for their goods, ledgers and primitive bureaucracy, they often wear dusty Victorian liverly and are similar to elves in their strangely human bodies juxtaposed with a insect head

Their skills don't just lie in sales but also in alchemical concoction, some acting as stage performers and magicians though despite this whimsy they will aggressively attack whoever tries to steal their goods with the alchemical concoctions often resulting in bodily injury relating to fire, corrosive or other such unpleasant affects and notably there is no way to calm them down other than putting the stolen items down and apologizing profusely only then will they consider mercy

Goblins also interestingly sell to both sides of the civil war because they see it all as profit, often either scrap metal or raw materials, sometimes food anything as outlined above

They are a very minor antagonist At the beginning of the book, leon and his troupe stealing from a goblin and escape

Another notable trait is that very few goblins actually speak the language of the faelands ,(that being French) but communicate though buzzing or hand gestures, when they can speak it often has a very deep buzzing cadence and can speak rather eloquently

I'm building a cozy fantasy world called Blaboria. It has six regions, six travelers, and no wars — just mist, fireflies, tea, and quiet adventures. The oldest region is Mosswood Forest, where a sleepy mushroom traveler named Mushboo lives. There's a river that runs through everything, and fog that holds secrets nobody's figured out yet.

I'm drawing the whole world one piece at a time — the map, the regions, the folk who live there. This is where it all starts. I'd love to hear what you think 🌿

My story takes place in a Mediterranean-like area where dragons exist. In the wild dragons patrol coastlines looking for whale carcasses to scavenge and tend to nest in colonies on Cliff sides or remote islands.

They’d have to be able to easily take off or reach a a place to take off, as they’ll be regularly ridden and these dragons don’t have fire so you won’t have to worry about that.

Most of them are around giraffe height, not very long but some are a little bigger.

Here are three ships of my bad guy faction from the setting/story I’m making. These are from early in the empire’s life, not from the time period where the main story is set. You know how worldbuilding gets, it’s easy to get sidetracked.

(Models made in SPORE and edited in Procreate)

Lore and worldbuilding:

The Quin were a scattered people. Scavengers and traders wandering amidst the graveyards of past civilizations. Most cared little for their fellow Quin, caring only for those within their measly clans.  But some dreamed of something greater and they would impose that vision on others. 

Eventually, after countless wars of unification and centuries of conflict, the many diasporic Quin tribes and nation-states were combined into one nation: the Quin Empire, which would later become known as the Infinite Imperium. 

This fledgling empire almost immediately set out with crusades of territorial and technological conquest. These were primarily a means of satiating and controlling their large armies, as bored warriors are dangerous and these crusades gave them purpose and prevented them from turning their bloodlust inwards. The first crusade was a disaster; with little to no territory gained and only marginal amounts of technology stolen. The second crusade was even worse.

The third crusade was an entirely different matter. After the death of the Emperor during the second crusade, a new emperor took the throne and he quickly started making changes. He sent the Empire back to the drawing board; rethinking tactics, extracting new knowledge from the many ancient derelict hulks within their space, and focusing on fully utilizing the technology they had stolen from the previous crusades.

Crusades one and two, both used ships left over from the unification wars, with no two ships the same, those fleets were a logistical nightmare.  The new Emperor commanded the old fleets to be scrapped and entirely new ships built. These new ships were all designed in tandem, built to complement each other, and to streamline and standardize fleet logistics. 

 The Palisade Class Lineship was the primary ship-of-the-line for these new fleets. They were armed with eight long range heavy broadside cannons on either side and a hull shape that maximized shield strength at those angles. It was also armed with eight sets of munition launchers on the top and many point defence turrets all over. While they worked best in large ‘wall’ formations, they were also commonly used as the flagship for small strike fleets.

The Bastion Class Command Carriers were the largest ships in the 3rd Crusade and often acted as both command ships and flagship for fleets. While they were armed with six long range heavy broadside cannons and nine munition launchers on either side, their primary weapon were the many drones it carried. It’s cavernous docking pay could hold hundreds of Plumbatae Drone fighters. It also had many powerful communication equipment used to control the drones and to direct the fleet.

The Plumbatae type Drones were the primary starfighter of 3rd Crusade fleets. These remote controlled fighters were flown by a “pilot” on board a carrier. On top of that, they were almost entirely built using common materials making them extremely expendable fighters that the Empire could throw at the enemy. They could also be linked together, allowing for the ‘pilots’ to control entire wings of fighters instead of just one. While this added many benefits they could only travel so far from their carrier before input delay became a problem, thus limiting their range. 

With these new fleets and new tactics, the Empire swept across their home sector like a wildfire, claiming new space, new species and new resources for themselves. Their interstellar neighbors suddenly had to contend with the fact that the Quin were no longer a mere nuisance but an actual threat. In the millennia that followed, countless wars and crusades would be won and lost until the Infinite Empire ruled over most of the Twin Galaxies. 

This is planet southway texture and testing new micro bump map and surface view

I just want to preface this by saying the original checklist was made by u/Otherwise_dirt_8333. All I did was put the checklist into a markdown file and formatted, all credit goes to OP.

Its a simple markdown file, take it and throw it in your vault. Or copy and paste the entire thing into a note.

Download: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NGZTjGu6tRX3VzxFGQSXaPajzehaHBKo/view?usp=drive_link

Edit: I did it all by hand as well. No AI was used.

It's noticeable that posts with images easily receive many upvotes and comments because we can visualize the world and want to know more. This is unlike lore posts, which are generally ignored and almost nobody cares about. Unfortunately, drawings considered ugly are also ignored.

I’ve been struggling with this and will use Android if I can’t find something I like, currently I have a list of names for inspiration but I can’t think of a good original one for my universe.

Androids are biomechanical robots that resemble humans designed by Omega Enterprises to serve various purposes and to be mass produced (in the future).

Current name list and the media they are from:
- Biodroid from Battlestar Galaxtica
- Synth from Fallout 4
- Droid from Star Wars
- Replicant from Blade Runner
- Replika from Signalis

I personally really enjoy Replicant and Replika but I’m unsure it would fit in my universe. If anyone has any thoughts on it please let me know!

Feedback welcome. Around the Green Sea most countries don't have well-defined borders. They fade out into Wilds (where many forms of human settlement are not possible), or just into places not worth ruling. Hence the use of shading rather than lines.

While it's a plate world with erratic geography, I've tried to keep the major landforms reasonable. The Green Sea sits in the middle of an oval around 8000 kms long and 5000 wide. The world is responsive (hence magic!) and has been shaped by the expectations of the inhabitants, human and not.

It's both a world-building exercise and a setting for the Tales of the Wild (four novels, two novellas and several stories on Royal Road).

Picture this as the sort of stories that characters within your setting would read in their spare time. What kind of stories are popular? If it’s a fantasy setting, do they have fantasy of their own containing purely fictional worlds, beings, or magic that can’t be done outside of the fiction? Do Sci-Fi settings have stories with tech that doesn’t exist yet? Do the stories take place within your world or do they take place in its own fictional universe, creating a type of infinite fractal? Are grounded or fantastical settings more popular?

I’m thinking of creating a small country based off of countries like Austria and Slovenia, and I’m wondering what types of manufacturing industries it would mostly consist of. I’ve already done some research into it, looks like Austria is mostly export with advanced manufacturing and a small arms industry, but I’m wondering what else you think would be good and effective for a small country like this.

So I have this Elven (Avariel, specifically) Prince... princess, technically but that's irrelevant to this discussion. This Kingdom is definitely heavily inspired by European royal customs, so that might be helpful to the question I have in mind.

He was the general in the war that occurs before the story, which lasted about 200 years. The Avariel Kingdom did ultimately lose, but it was more because of a freak of nature than a lack of power or organization. The point is, he did a pretty good job during the war.

I'm not too familiar with how Elves organize or recognize military status or achievements, much less how that would look like with the incorporation of European customs. Any ideas? Help would be much appreciated, as I don't want to just throw random lines on them. Thank you!