World-building Constraints (Watch out for falling tangents)

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

*Note: all second person pronouns are inetended as entirely hypothetical.

There are plenty of threads on plenty of forums about world-building. This one is a little different. Most world-building threads ask, "How do you do it?" "What profiles do you use?" "Is it okay to change a profile as you go?" I'm concerned less with how world-building restricts your "artistic freedom" (and yes, artistic freedom is important, but there's more to writing than that, at least as I see it), and more with how the restrictions it creates can be useful in writing a good story.

*I usually deal with fantasy world-building, but sci-fi doesn't faze me.

Definitions of Terms Used (my definition, not anybody else's, so I'm making them clear at the beginning):

World-building- the creation or alteration of worlds used to create a background for a story.

Con-worlding- the creation of a fictional/alternate world--often used more specifically to refer to the act of creating a world for it's own sake, but I'm using a broader meaning here, which allows for any purpose.

Basic necessities- this refers to the necessary parts of world-building for an author, and includes anything the world needs for the story to function; these do not have to be explicit in the story. Example: the Mountains of Dhoom, because there needs to be an evil mountain range to guard/contain the Overlord's castle.

Irrelevancies- anything that the story can function without, pure writers can tend to avoid these, con-worlders don't understand the concept. Example: Tides--the kind two moons would create... But hey, maybe you'd rather spend time developing Melony's selfish streak?

Just to get a few more things straight:

1. I am, besides being an avid reader and writer, a con-worlder. This may slant my opinions to a certain extent, but I will try to remind myself that this is a thread about writing stories, not creating worlds. If I let it sway me too far, feel free to point that out and I'll try to fix it.

2. The story comes first; the story always comes first. But a story is based in coherent reality, and when you are pulling that reality out of your ass, things tend to get complicated. Thus the world-building.

Okay, so the real point I'm after is that constraints can actually contribute to the reality and fun of writing a story.

So the position of the River of Butterflies means you'll have to rethink that straight line to Garbelville. Quick, change the riverbed! But wait... what would happen if you followed the river to the nearest bridge or ferry?

So Michael falls off a cliff... maybe if I remove gravity from the equation... But wait... suppose he died? How would John recover before the Dragon of Whistlepuffs arrives to attack him?

My examples may be a bit corny, but I'm hoping you get the point. There's nothing necessarily wrong with changing that profile (I'm not a fan of profiles. They can help some people, but I prefer a more eclectic approach), but you are striving for reality, right? Well, is your brain really a powerful enough computer to simulate every possible factor that might be in play in a real-world situation? How fast do rivers really flow? Will stopping the rain to keep your heroine's mink coat sparkling white really not cause a draught the next town over? Can you honestly calculate the continental drift of the North Atlantic plate for the last fifty years off the top of your head? Can that matriarchal monarchy really work? Might it not be better to let your own rules win for once? How many DEMs can a serious reader stomach?

(Please see later post for clarification of question.)

mscelina · Jul 31, 2008

Hmm. I found that quite interesting. Of course, as a mere whiny, bitchy, moaning, corny, incompetent writer (save for spelling, of course) I couldn't possibly argue with a single word you've said.

EXCEPT--well, maybe just a few...

I have about forty worlds constructed and have only used five of them so far. Yes, yes, I know--a dilettante, right?

Wrong. I build worlds because I like to build worlds...and stories that play out upon them. I actually place my newest WIPs on my already built-worlds, sometimes moving them from one to the other like changing dresses on a Barbie doll. Why do I do that? Because it's FUN. So in that vein, you and I might have a common basis.

However...

I would also point out that not everyone operates under the same mindframe as you, or me, when it comes to world building. World building is just as personal an event as writing is. And for anyone to come onto a writers' forum and to rant about how...what was it again? Ah yes--

1. I am, besides being an avid reader and writer, a conworlder. This may slant my opinions to a certain extent, but I will try to remind myself that this is a thread about writing, and not a rant to fellow conworlders about how pathetic writers are. They are lazy, whiney, bitchy, moany, incompetetent, incapable, airheads who... erm, excuse me..., was my keyboard plugged in there? Oops, sorry.

--then I'd have to say they probably didn't take the best approach to share their expertise with the rest of the board. *shrug* Just sayin'...

I should probably point out that some of the writers on this forum have managed to combine exquisite worldbuilding with strong writing. I could even mention that the worldbuilding file for my Asphodel series is bigger than the first book, but c'est la vie. What I will point out instead is that different stories--different worlds--are distinct and individual creations of a writer's mind. Just as no two minds are alike, no two stories or worlds are alike either.

And there is no 'right' way to build a world. The people who worry about profiles do so because that falls within their comfort zones; the people who don't do just fine without them. And if for some reason, one of my readers is more worried about the physical technicalities of a two-moon tidal system than they are about the PEOPLE IN MY STORY, then I've failed in my purpose as a writer--to entertain.

The created world is the canvas, the story is the art. When the canvas overpowers the art then the entire episode is a failure.

Thanks for sharing your rant. I have to get back to work now.

sunandshadow · Jul 31, 2008

Stories exist to explore the arc of development of a plot and/or characters. (Waits for everyone and their aunt Hootie to object to that statement, but that's my personal opinion about what the central purpose of fiction is.) Anyway, depending on the individual writer they may feel that plot is slightly more important than character development, that character development is slightly more important than plot, or that the two are equally important and inextricably intertwined (perhaps the dancer is the dance). But in all of these cases, worldbuilding exists to support plot, character development, or both.

The worldbuilding needs to be logically consistent with itself of course, but in an ideal situation it should be editable throughout the writing process so that at the end the final form of the worldbuilding should be whatever best supports the plot and character development. In practice though, this is impractical in any situation where some part of the story has already been published, which includes both shared worlds and any kind of series. Retconning is evil, although occasionally it can be managed as a cool twist/reveal.

So I would say that as an author who chooses to participate in a shared world or write a sequel to anything already published, one morally obligates oneself to avoid creating inconsistencies. There are gray areas though - in some cases the inconsistency really wouldn't be important, and in some cases the previously published work is to crappy to deserve the respect of staying consistent with it, and in some cases where the work has only been published to the internet it is still editable and insisting on changes may even improve it.

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

Celina- you hit a major part of the point with your final comment. It was a bit of a rant. (I've tried to tone it down a bit, apologies.) Nor am I in any way claiming to be an expert. I also made note that my opinions as stated here don't come entirely from an entirely writerly perspective. I've tried to polarize them a bit to get to the point. I'm not saying that there aren't plenty of other workable approaches.

I'm certainly not qualified to hold court on the interaction amongst the various parts of story mechanics, ie, plot vs. characters vs. setting, etc. Amusingly enough, perhaps I've fallen into the trap you've mentioned, and let the background overpower the point. So, to be a bit more clear and brief:

People often talk about the characters grabbing the reins in the middle of a story, but does anyone have experience with the setting doing something similar?

AMCrenshaw · Jul 31, 2008

When the setting isn't a character, it's boring anyway. Characters who do not interact with the setting are boring. If the place, the world, or whatever, is the "central" character, but has no personality (it could, couldn't it?), the story is boring. If the setting is the main character, how could we possibly empathize with it? Bored!

Rather, as we know, settings should complement characters by becoming as vivid as characters. But whosoever says that character drives plot almost must include within these characters the worlds they are in. Just look at Connecticut Yankee, for example. So, in a roundabout way, all stories are driven by the worlds in which they are set. I think a disciplined writer knows this implicitly, and an amateur, like me, has to remind himself once in a while.

AMC

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

AMCrenshaw said:
When the setting isn't a character, it's boring anyway. Characters who do not interact with the setting are boring. If the place, the world, or whatever, is the "central" character, but has no personality (it could, couldn't it?), the story is boring. If the setting is the main character, how could we possibly empathize with it? Bored!

Rather, as we know, settings should complement characters by becoming as vivid as characters. But whosoever says that character drives plot almost must include within these characters the worlds they are in. Just look at Connecticut Yankee, for example. So, in a roundabout way, all stories are driven by the worlds in which they are set. I think a disciplined writer knows this implicitly, and an amateur, like me, has to remind himself once in a while.

AMC

So, if the setting is such an important character, why does it get the raw end of the deal in the story? I hear a lot about changing the story to fit the characters, and changing the setting to fit the story, but the setting itself seems never to have a real effect.

That's what I mean by "constraints". If the setting is "set" to some extent, couldn't you find a little more man vs. nature conflict? It seems that man vs. man and man vs. society get all the carriage rides and chocolate cake. After all, the setting changes so easily, and nobody really cares about it, right?

mscelina · Jul 31, 2008

No, Liosse, I didn't ignore anything in your post. Just the same way that you managed to 'accidentally' leave your keyboard plugged in so that you could manage to insult writers while emphasizing your disassociation from the lazy, whiny, bitchy airheads.
By directly quoting you as a 'conworlder' I didn't ignore your POV at all. I just didn't find it funny, endearing, or helpful. You got your point across; I got mine. *shrug*

Enough about that, though. I'm trying to figure out what you're asking. I just wonder what the purpose of having the setting 'grab the reins' in the middle of the story would be? It would make the purpose of the story be --- descriptive? Or, are you talking about a sentient world? Because that would be very different.

See, I approach world building from the point of view that by the time I write the story, I know all the answers about my world: geography, climate, socio-political divisions, religious/mythological lore, history. I have a system of time, a calendar, currency, temples, gods, guilds or unions, educational systems, legal systems, et cetera and so forth. I also have a cross-reference to whatever culture I stole 'my' world from on this world. I don't do this to tell the story of the world; I do this so that all of those elements will be second nature to my characters, to develop them and give them a strong background that forms their nature. So while the setting influences the story, by providing character development and usually some external conflicts the MC must resolve/overcome, it's never a centerpiece of what I do.

ETA: Cross posted with Liosse. Aha! Now I get it. Liosse, you're upset because the setting gets shafted by some writers? is that what this is all about? Look, experienced writers almost always find their story impacted by the setting--the setting presents conflicts and obstacles which help the story along. I think you'd be hard pressed to find a spec fic writer who doesn't care about the setting. There might be some (like me) who could give a rat's patootey if the curtains in the throne room are green--but by the same token, you can't have battles without knowing the topography, you can't have journeys without mountains and rivers, or seasons or weather, and, the last time I checked, you can't have rivers roll up a mountain unless you specifically allow for it. Most of the spec fic writers I'm reading these days make a concerted effort to weave the setting and the story together: Carey, Vandermeer, Elliott.

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

I wasn't attempting disassociation. I wouldn't be on a writing forum if I wasn't a(n amateur--of course) writer. Enough about that though.

As I noted, the story comes first.

The confusion here may or may not be due to different writing styles. Each story is individual, and so is each writer. I tend to jump into the story without extensive planning of the plot, maybe just a few main points at most (but I do have a fair amount of research/con-worlding done). While the world itself is never intended to be an explicit character, it's fairly active in the story.

One of the reasons I've never been much into RPs is that it's very hard to keep track of all the factors. In fiction, you have a lot of leeway from the reader to order things as you like without too much respect for consequences stemming from an entire living world. And I'm not saying that that's a bad thing. But many stories, and this includes some which are published, have a disturbing lack of respect for the setting, even the parts dilineated by their own rules and statements.

I'm not saying that the setting should "Grab the reins"(that's just the best analogy I can think of at the moment), but I think really well-moulded settings have a lot more to offer than most people allow. It's all very well to travel through a place, but that doesn't mean the place will take it lying down. Worlds and more importantly the stories in them are alive (or should be--yes I'm making an over-generalization, apologies; I'm not making declarations, just putting forth some thoughts for possible discussion).

sunandshadow · Jul 31, 2008

There are certainly some stories in which setting is very important. Anything involving a natural disaster/dangerous weather or stranding/marooning or travel through unusual and dangerous terrain like mountains, deserts, jungles, and underwater, many horror stories both Lovecraftian and Kingian, anything post-apocalyptic or occurring partially in virtual reality, and anything that involves traveling through a special building like an ancient temple or an enemy stronghold.

But that said, I have had the setting grab the reigns in some of my stories and generally it was a bad thing because it resulted in an indigestible 1,000-3,000 word lump of exposition. Particularly irritating when it occurs in the middle of a dialogue. x_X Even people who love worldbuilding don't really like that kind of thing, so I have to go back and break it up and work it in throughout the story.

SPMiller · Jul 31, 2008

You managed not only to insult me, but also to leave me wondering what exactly the point is of those huge chunks of text.

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

Insults and snide comments removed, I've tried to focus each post more on explaining my proposition. Apologies. I'll try rephrasing again:

When writing a story, one chooses a particular setting for a reason. Many Sci-Fi writers like to say it's not really SF if you can tell the same story in a different setting. So yes, the characters are important, and never less important than the setting. So when you choose a setting, it needs to be integral to the story. It doesn't have to be alive, or take the reins, but it needs to be more than a blank wall you can repaint every time the story doesn't quite fit it.

The story comes first, but no solely. Many writers say that if the story doesn't fit the characters, you may be writing the wrong story. Well, the same thing should(could) apply to the setting, and not only in fantasy and SF, but certainly especially in F/SF. If characters used as plot devices alone make a bad story, then doesn't some part of that apply to other elements? So, if the story is stuck because of the setting, can it not be useful to look at the issue from both perspectives?

Just because your chronology requires you to reach said city in three days, doesn't mean that you need to mangle a previous setting that prevents you from achieving that goal. Maybe you just have to deal with being late; it's not the writer's fault the river happened to flood that convenient ford.

Now, not everyon does or even can work like that; and I'm not saying they have to. But it is something to consider.

Pthom · Jul 31, 2008

The moderator looks in, shakes his head and wonders how such a simple (albiet lengthy) question got all turned around into a personal slam fest.

Stop it.

From now on in this thread, we'll deal only with the problem distilled from the initial post: constraints one places on world building in favor of story.

Otherwise, this thread will be closed. Okay?

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

Pthom said:
The moderator looks in, shakes his head and wonders how such a simple (albiet lengthy) question got all turned around into a personal slam fest.

Stop it.

From now on in this thread, we'll deal only with the problem distilled from the initial post: constraints one places on world building in favor of story.

Otherwise, this thread will be closed. Okay?

I was going more for "constraints placed through world-building". Sorry to cause so much trouble.

Pthom · Jul 31, 2008

Liosse de Velishaf said:
I was going more for "constraints placed through world-building". Sorry to cause so much trouble.

Okay. I read it backwards. Happens sometimes.

But then, it seems to me that if a writer has in mind a grand story, it is backwards to then halter it by placing elements of her created world in the way.

Unless, of course, the world element is integral to the story (such as a river or the atmosphere or magic). Then, isn't the world a character and there is no constraint other than what she places on any of her other characters?

If I write a story that takes place in Seattle, I might make up a building or a house, but the overall character of the city is fixed--it's the way Seattle really is. Normally, I just say things happen in Seattle, haul out a road map or tourist guide to ensure I have a few pertinant place names correct, and have my characters move through it. Much as a lab rat moves through a maze.

When I have a story in mind and mean to put a hurdle in the way of a protagonist's goal and that hurdle is say, a rogue asteroid on a collision course with the space station, I haven't constrained anything except the how the character deals with the dilemma--and that is integral to the story.

On the other hand, if the story requires Billy and Suzy cross the river and make it to Grandma's house in a certain period of time and that not doing so would hurt the story, then I won't have the bridge out without providing the kids a boat.

Am I seeing this your way?

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

Pthom said:
Okay. I read it backwards. Happens sometimes.

But then, it seems to me that if a writer has in mind a grand story, it is backwards to then halter it by placing elements of her created world in the way.

Unless, of course, the world element is integral to the story (such as a river or the atmosphere or magic). Then, isn't the world a character and there is no constraint other than what she places on any of her other characters?

If I write a story that takes place in Seattle, I might make up a building or a house, but the overall character of the city is fixed--it's the way Seattle really is. Normally, I just say things happen in Seattle, haul out a road map or tourist guide to ensure I have a few pertinant place names correct, and have my characters move through it. Much as a lab rat moves through a maze.

When I have a story in mind and mean to put a hurdle in the way of a protagonist's goal and that hurdle is say, a rogue asteroid on a collision course with the space station, I haven't constrained anything except the how the character deals with the dilemma--and that is integral to the story.

On the other hand, if the story requires Billy and Suzy cross the river and make it to Grandma's house in a certain period of time and that not doing so would hurt the story, then I won't have the bridge out without providing the kids a boat.

Am I seeing this your way?

Yes, that is what I was asking. Sorry if I was unclear.

So this brings up one question at least, that being: How much do you allow your story to live on its own, and how willing are you to let "mistakes" take you in a different direction?

For me, I don't plan my stories out in the majority of details.

I might have a basic idea of what happens, but if something unexpected occurs, I check my notes(read: reams of con-worlding data), and if it fits that, let the issue run its course. Often, the story can place its own hurdles better than I can. I do understand, though, that not all writers work that way.

For me, a story is alive, and so is the place where the story exists. If the world comes up with a difficulty I hadn't considered, I'm often content to let it have its way. Nothing ever goes entirely according to plan, especially because you don't know everything; the real world takes no favorites, and follows its own rules. When's the last time you ("you" being a hypothetical person) broke a natural law? I can't be expected to be a miracle-wroker all the time.

In a sense, my characters do run the story. I might know everything (though I don't, necessarily), but the character has to make plans that fit them and their circumstances with a lot less information. Sometimes, they get it wrong. I might want them to reach the Good King's Castle in three days, but their limited perspective keeps them from understanding the urgency, and their motivations may be vastly different. So they see more "options" than I do. Ever more than just the world being a character, it must interact with the other characters. Can anyone say they are able to predict the outcome of an interaction between two animate things with perfect accuracy?

I could force everything to come out my way, but it'd be damned hard to keep everything looking natural. In a good story, there's a good reason for everything. Sometimes, there's not a good reason for the story to follow my direction, and I respect that.

sunandshadow · Jul 31, 2008

Liosse de Velishaf said:
Many Sci-Fi writers like to say it's not really SF if you can tell the same story in a different setting.

I think I've heard people say that but I don't personally agree. When I come up with a story idea it might not work in a realistic setting, but it could usually work in a few different settings, some of which being fantasy and some science fiction.

Liosse de Velishaf · Jul 31, 2008

sunandshadow said:
I think I've heard people say that but I don't personally agree. When I come up with a story idea it might not work in a realistic setting, but it could usually work in a few different settings, some of which being fantasy and some science fiction.

I think I've co-opted the comment a bit. It probably refers more to the argument over SF themes vs. SF settings as the determiner of genre.

To an extent, I agree that it is not entirely accurate.

The argument could be made that "story idea" is a bit too general, since it could refer to an "idea" on any nuber of levels of complexity and detail, but I think that for the most part, there's always the possibility of putting a story in a different genre. The finer points come in when certain elements of the genre are integral to the plot, so that switching genres means it isn't exactly the same story anymore, but genre lines are often very wiggly, and most of the issue refers to speculative vs. realistic fiction.

Faolmor · Jul 31, 2008

Liosse de Velishaf said:
People often talk about the characters grabbing the reins in the middle of a story, but does anyone have experience with the setting doing something similar?

Yes.

Especially as I have developed and built my world. I came to realise that (as a lame example) the lay of the land in one area meant that, despite what my heart was telling me the story needed to do, my brain was saying that my MCs couldn't possibly have achieved what I wanted, because geography prevented it.

I came to realise the social system of one of the tribes I had created was completely wrong...because of the relationship between the climate, florae, faunae etc would have ultimately affected their social history to arrive at a whole different place than where I'd envisaged.

I was forced to address the overwhelming issue of tyrany of distance in an agrarian world...that if it was 4000 miles for A to B, my MCs would take a damn long time to get there.

I have any number of examples of the above.

However...personally...as my main goal is to tell a story, and not to document a world, much of this is "sotto voce" knowledge. That is, I know it, but I don't necessarily need to bore the reader senseless by info-dumping stuff that remains irrelevant to the plot (despite the fact that, obviously, the constraints of the world influences the plot, if I'm striving for "real" reality). As long as it is woven into the background of the story, I am satisfied. And hopefully my readers respond by feeling that my world has weight.

Does this make sense? Sorry, I'm struggling a bit today...

Faolmor · Jul 31, 2008

AMCrenshaw said:
When the setting isn't a character, it's boring anyway. Characters who do not interact with the setting are boring. If the place, the world, or whatever, is the "central" character, but has no personality (it could, couldn't it?), the story is boring. If the setting is the main character, how could we possibly empathize with it? Bored!
AMC

Bingo. Perfect.

Faolmor · Jul 31, 2008

Liosse de Velishaf said:
Yes, that is what I was asking. Sorry if I was unclear.

So this brings up one question at least, that being: How much do you allow your story to live on its own, and how willing are you to let "mistakes" take you in a different direction?

For me, I don't plan my stories out in the majority of details.

I might have a basic idea of what happens, but if something unexpected occurs, I check my notes(read: reams of con-worlding data), and if it fits that, let the issue run its course. Often, the story can place its own hurdles better than I can. I do understand, though, that not all writers work that way.

For me, a story is alive, and so is the place where the story exists. If the world comes up with a difficulty I hadn't considered, I'm often content to let it have its way. Nothing ever goes entirely according to plan, especially because you don't know everything; the real world takes no favorites, and follows its own rules. When's the last time you ("you" being a hypothetical person) broke a natural law? I can't be expected to be a miracle-wroker all the time.

In a sense, my characters do run the story. I might know everything (though I don't, necessarily), but the character has to make plans that fit them and their circumstances with a lot less information. Sometimes, they get it wrong. I might want them to reach the Good King's Castle in three days, but their limited perspective keeps them from understanding the urgency, and their motivations may be vastly different. So they see more "options" than I do. Ever more than just the world being a character, it must interact with the other characters. Can anyone say they are able to predict the outcome of an interaction between two animate things with perfect accuracy?

I could force everything to come out my way, but it'd be damned hard to keep everything looking natural. In a good story, there's a good reason for everything. Sometimes, there's not a good reason for the story to follow my direction, and I respect that.

Firstly, I'll apologise here for the triple post...I really should have read the WHOLE thread before I posted in the first instance. And the second instance. Sorry.

To answer this question, Liosse...I have written a 800,000 word MS without ANY plan whatsoever. I started with an overall world map, broke it down into continental maps, then country maps, then town maps...story set.

Granted, I am now undertaken a massive editing process to cut down the story into something far more polished and publishable. But...the fact is that the story and the setting are absolutely fused. The story has influenced the setting, yes...but there are far more instances of the setting influencing the story. To the point where I have rewritten massive chunks of the story, based on the constraints outlined by the setting. In every instance, this has IMPROVED the story. Several reasons why:

- Realism in relation to characters' actions
- Realism in relation to characters' decisions
- Realism in relation to characters' SOCIAL interpretation of events (eg, if they each come from a different country - even a different town [when two towns might be 3 days apart] they're going to think differently and react differently to different circumstances
- Realism in relation to historical influence on social interpretations across cultures (easily determined by looking at simple physical distance between borders and how this MUST influence society and culture)
- Many other reasons, too numerous and possibly boring to others to mention here!

Now, as you've (rightly) stated, the story must always take priority. Otherwise, we might as well just publish a book about the world, with no story whatsoever. But setting is integral to story in fantasy, and IMVHO, should be.

Everyone has their own personal preferences, of course, but I don't bother with fantasy that doesn't feel real. Doesn't mean it can't and shouldn't be fantasy. It can be loaded with dragons, magic, new worlds, amazing creatures...and still feel entirely real - PROVIDING the world has depth and weight. Otherwise, it's just a rather imaginative tale about some world I don't care about.

Was I making a point? I forgot. Oh yes! My point is that yes, I do permit my story to be influenced by setting. Any writer (aka world advocate)should be willing to at least allow setting to take them somewhere they perhaps weren't expecting to go. Let's face it, our characters know their world better than we do. Should we always trust them? No. Not if we want to be published. But we should certainly listen to them...and definitely be willing to learn about their world from them. If we can't see their world through their eyes, how will our readers do the same?

Apologies once again for rambling, non-sensical reply...

Liosse de Velishaf · Aug 1, 2008

Faolmor said:
Was I making a point? I forgot. Oh yes! My point is that yes, I do permit my story to be influenced by setting. Any writer (aka world advocate)should be willing to at least allow setting to take them somewhere they perhaps weren't expecting to go. Let's face it, our characters know their world better than we do. Should we always trust them? No. Not if we want to be published. But we should certainly listen to them...and definitely be willing to learn about their world from them. If we can't see their world through their eyes, how will our readers do the same?

Apologies once again for rambling, non-sensical reply...

It's a bit funny, but I was thinking a little differently in the section you quoted, though I agree with all the points you've made. The character in a real fantasy world of the general type is likely to know far more about their own part of the world than the author, but if they're someone who's say, a blacksmith in a village three days from any other, they may know very little about the rest of the world. That's where the setting can come into its own. The author needs them in a forest a hundred miles away, but the character doesn't know the river just flooded a week ago, so they find a river they can't cross. So damn! but they're not getting to the forest on time. Looks like the elves lose the battle (and elves should lose the majority of their battles, the stuck-up pricks!). That weather-working last chapter looked so great at the time, but you've put out the house-fire only to deny the Light Army reinforcements. Though, I guess this does mean I agree that characters are un-trustworthy...

Higgins · Aug 1, 2008

sunandshadow said:
Stories exist to explore the arc of development of a plot and/or characters. (Waits for everyone and their aunt Hootie to object to that statement, but that's my personal opinion about what the central purpose of fiction is.) Anyway, depending on the individual writer they may feel that plot is slightly more important than character development, that character development is slightly more important than plot, or that the two are equally important and inextricably intertwined (perhaps the dancer is the dance). But in all of these cases, worldbuilding exists to support plot, character development, or both.

The worldbuilding needs to be logically consistent with itself of course, but in an ideal situation it should be editable throughout the writing process so that at the end the final form of the worldbuilding should be whatever best supports the plot and character development. In practice though, this is impractical in any situation where some part of the story has already been published, which includes both shared worlds and any kind of series. Retconning is evil, although occasionally it can be managed as a cool twist/reveal.

So I would say that as an author who chooses to participate in a shared world or write a sequel to anything already published, one morally obligates oneself to avoid creating inconsistencies. There are gray areas though - in some cases the inconsistency really wouldn't be important, and in some cases the previously published work is to crappy to deserve the respect of staying consistent with it, and in some cases where the work has only been published to the internet it is still editable and insisting on changes may even improve it.

I write fiction that is somewhere between fantasy and Sci-fi. The worlds I use are essentially minor variations on the present world (if the present goes back as far as say 580 AD). This is partly because we really only have one example of a world. Even for say outlandish things like Ice Ages and swamps full of Phytosaurs we only have this one sequence of possibilities. There seem to be enough half-forgotten or barely esoterically reconstructed aspects of our present world to last through a lot of fiction. Or to put it another way, the only real constraints on the plausibility of invented worlds is this world. The one we know something about.

tehuti88 · Aug 1, 2008

Liosse de Velishaf said:
People often talk about the characters grabbing the reins in the middle of a story, but does anyone have experience with the setting doing something similar?

*without having read all the previous posts, or the ones that came after this one*

My setting usually IS a character, even if informally (though in my current WIP it actually is a character, yes). So it can grab the reins just as much as one of the physical, talking/walking characters can.

I won't address any of the other points that may have been brought up in this thread because in truth, it was all so long and complicated I could not follow most of it, apologies.

Pthom · Aug 1, 2008

Strunk wrote: Use no unnecessary words. We would all do well to heed his advice.

sunandshadow · Aug 1, 2008

Higgins said:
I write fiction that is somewhere between fantasy and Sci-fi. The worlds I use are essentially minor variations on the present world (if the present goes back as far as say 580 AD). This is partly because we really only have one example of a world. Even for say outlandish things like Ice Ages and swamps full of Phytosaurs we only have this one sequence of possibilities. There seem to be enough half-forgotten or barely esoterically reconstructed aspects of our present world to last through a lot of fiction. Or to put it another way, the only real constraints on the plausibility of invented worlds is this world. The one we know something about.

That's an interesting perspective. Totally different from mine.

Personally, I have no interest in realism and instead strive for verisimilitude. Possibly this is a result that I'm not a detail person at all, I think in terms of theories and patterns and symbolism. Totally zero interest in geography, weather systems, astrophysics, and to some extent gravity and history. So when I worldbuild I generally build places that have no relation to Earth, and the very first question I ask myself is, "What effect do I want this world to have on the characters?" That includes things like, where do I want the characters to live relative to each other at the start of the story, how do I want their cultures to have evolved, what kind of jobs and technology do I want them to have.

As a typical example of what I create, in one case I wanted to write about two recently-evolutionarily-diverged intelligent species living next to each other in slightly different ecological niches. In both cases these were bipedal feathered lizard-people. The smaller species could fly, were solitary hunters of forest prey from rabbit-dear size (as well as fructivores) and lived more spread apart in nuclear families. The other had, in exchange for growing larger, lost the ability to fly and banded together in villages on the plains so they could pack-hunt the cow-dinosaur sized prey there. Since I wanted them to live within a day's walk of each other, my setting was the border between a grassland and a forest. That's all - I didn't need any other setting, so I didn't make any. If I had needed to explain why there was a forest and a grassland next to each other I could have invented some reason, but it was totally irrelevant to the story. I believe I mentioned that the larger species lived near the forest because they needed wood for a lot of things and still liked to eat fruit, but I could just as easily have said they needed water and any further out in the grassland would have been too dry, or they lived there because there was a deposit of clay they needed to make pots, or any number of reasons.

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