The "How Well do YOU Know Your World?" game!

JDWallawine

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That would have to be crystals made of pure Spirit energy. Unlike naturally-formed crystals, crystals made of pure spell energy have the potential to house far greater amounts of power. Also pure Spirit energy, unlike other forms of spell energy, can be used to power any spell.

Unfortunately only a being of the astral plane, like a god or devil or dragon, has the strength of will to compress spell energy into a crystalline form. Likewise without the will to create and maintain the crystalline form, its use has the potential of destabilizing the crystal, releasing its energy with devastating effects.

Question: What is the biggest difference, or fundamental assumption that seperates your world and the one we know today?
 

lilyWhite

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Question: What is the biggest difference, or fundamental assumption that seperates your world and the one we know today?

The existence of magical beings from another dimension. Their first appearance in the human world was an invasion of a city called Garden City, but five mysterious human heroines with their own magical powers defended the citizens from their plots and exposed the deceits of the invasion's mastermind. After the conflict came to an end, humans and Outsiders negotiated a treaty between worlds, and several years later the first Outsiders came to Garden City not as conquerors but as guests and new citizens. Though one might think magic itself would completely change the world, the Outsiders can only live in Garden City (both in that they're forbidden to go elsewhere in the human world and they can't survive away from the portal between worlds) and very strict and fervently-enforced regulations to keep peace between worlds have meant that magic and the Outsiders have had little impact even on the citizens of Garden City, other than the occasional sighting of a six-legged deer-centaur among pedestrian traffic or other such inhuman beings.


Is there a power or faction in your setting that exists to oppose another power or faction?
 

D. E. Wyatt

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Is there a power or faction in your setting that exists to oppose another power or faction?

Guilds of Defense are SERIOUS BUSINESS. One can have a monopoly on the teaching of the sword in an entire kingdom, which could lead to outright bloodshed if another guild attempts to encroach upon their charter. It extends not just from one guild to another, but one MASTER to another, particularly once it starts to involve rivalries between tournament fighters and duelists, with the latter being particularly disparaging of the show fighters, whose art is centered around pleasing the audience as opposed to actually FIGHTING. These guilds are also political pawns: One noble may support a guild entirely because a rival gives their patronage to another, while some feel outright threatened by the amount of control the guilds have in their territories, and seek to undermine their influence to protect their own power.

This is loosely based on the historical Guilds of Defense, particularly the Brotherhood of St. Mark, which had an overwhelming control over the teaching of fencing in the Holy Roman Empire for over a century until the establishment of the Federfechter in the late-16th Century.

What facet of modern society which is common place and taken for granted is in your setting a major cultural taboo?
 

JDWallawine

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What facet of modern society which is common place and taken for granted is in your setting a major cultural taboo?

In the future most children born are fitted with a neural uplink that, when activated on their 18th birthday, allows them direct access to the Internet as well as most electric devices. However as the procedure is near fatal for anyone beyond puberty, the older generation are still reliant on external devices.

As the first generation of implanted begin to reach middle aged and start taking positions of power in the world, stigma toward the handhelds begins to grow. Starting with a smear campaign focusing on their obviously slower ability to network, the handhelds are quickly made out to be second class citizens. Even when a naturalist movement begins to grow, refusing to implant their children, they are quickly vilified as child abusers robing kids of a future.

Now with the majority of the population fitted with implants, the handhelds live as hackers and rebels. Using micro electronics and digital contact lenses, they try their best to fit into a world that thinks they are obsolete.

As my story takes place in modern times I decided to come up with this. When I started I was trying to make fun of smartphone users, yet they came off more as the good guys.

Question: What is the most unique creature/character you have developed?
 

Cobalt Jade

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In my published fiction, it's a draephlix, a flying fox/dragon/phoenix hybrid with four feathered wings the defenders of a town use to keep it safe from invaders.

In actuality, it's a sluglike gas-bag invertebrate that sucks its rider's blood. But since it always flies so high and commoners never see it up close, it's depicted as the prettier creature.

What breeds of dogs are there in your world?
 

kwanzaabot

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In my published fiction, it's a draephlix, a flying fox/dragon/phoenix hybrid with four feathered wings the defenders of a town use to keep it safe from invaders.

In actuality, it's a sluglike gas-bag invertebrate that sucks its rider's blood. But since it always flies so high and commoners never see it up close, it's depicted as the prettier creature.

What breeds of dogs are there in your world?

My dogs are all generally mongrels ("short-haired collies of questionable origin" is the descriptor I use), but I use specific breeds of livestock. I've got Manx Loaghtan sheep:

69881e54fe2f8acdcb4224f35c84d0e9.jpg


...and Markhor goats:

593px-Markhor_Schraubenziege_Capra_falconeri_Zoo_Augsburg-02.jpg


...because they're just so delightfully weird.

This is basically a Narnia-like world (the Bermuda Triangle of the Multiverse) where people and animals from our world have ended up in this world and adapted, so the wildlife is generally pretty odd. I've got river dolphins, freshwater seals, mammoths that are used in farming like Asian elephants, cold-weather crocodiles (imagine an Aussie saltwater croc, except it's covered in blubber and incredibly lazy to conserve energy), and my favourite: the Paxtyrannus (or "thunderbird", as the locals say), a heavily-feathered Tyrannosaur (my inspiration was the Yutyrannus, which unlike the T. rex, actually has some evidence of being feathered). Separated from their large-scale prey and their equally large competition in the Cretaceous, they've basically ramped-up their scavenging behaviour and evolved away their aggression. They're basically big vultures, and while they're dangerous if cornered (just like any big animal, really), they're also hyper-timid like a deer or wild horse.

So, uh, I guess that's not really the answer you were looking for, huh? I just think a unique ecosystem helps make a world feel real.

But I like animal questions, so here's another.

What breeds of cat do you have in your world?
 
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Cobalt Jade

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I have the Rhaydes Cat, "red and black and brown, with comical patches of white" that is bred and magically enhanced to hunt rats and mice in the nobles' stables.

A-calico-cat.jpg
 

benacrow

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Question: What is the biggest difference, or fundamental assumption that separates your world and the one we know today?

The world we know today is driven by technology and mechanical/digital marvels, but the basis for my world began with the idea that technology didn't advance from a rise of machines, but from the rise of being one with nature. City layouts are created using technologies that harmonize with the forces of nature. For example, the city based on oceanographic forces was built upon a massive plume of water. Its foundation is supported by this plume, and the city itself uses this source of energy to create walkways of cohesive water suspended above the city.

Question: What is the established hierarchy of your world? What decides where power resides, and why is this the established precedence?
 

JDWallawine

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Question: What is the established hierarchy of your world? What decides where power resides, and why is this the established precedence?

Well in the allied races' territory, I think the best way to describe it would be a "Grassroots" system. Inspired by a "resource based economy", the allied races use their advanced computer systems to monitor resource accumulation and reserves while simultaneously tracking demand through consumption and public opinion gauged by a voting system open to any who wish to participate and tracked by an individual's unique energy signature. The system is enforced within by counsellors who mediate any disputes between citizens, and from outside threats by the military that, like all professions, is voluntary without obligation. With the resources of several solar systems and the populations of dozens of planets, there is no shortage of eager volunteers to improve and protect their way of life as well as the resources needed.

The rest of the galaxy is either neutral with countless forms of governance, like Earth, or dominated by the Demonic order, a classic Autocracy historically decided by mortal combat. Now leadership is decided through a ritual of champions, as to prevent the most powerful demons from destroying each other thus weakening the order.

Question: What lie/misconception is accepted as true by the majority of the population? [/B]
 

Moardragons

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Question: What lie/misconception is accepted as true by the majority of the population?

Won't get any points for originality, but it's that magic doesn't exist anymore, and/or it'll never directly affect most people.

The way I have magic working is that the study of magic is sort of like the study of law, but much more complicated. There are a very small number of magic-users who spend at least 50 years studying tomes in Eldertowers attached to castles. If they live to 60 or 70, they can use their studies to craft book-length spells that bring about natural phenomena (parting seas, raising mountains, stopping droughts, scorching earth). The catch is, the wizards' Eldertowers have a bond with their castles. This bond links the wizard to the ruler, so he has to act according to his Lord's will (in theory-more on this later.) So, wizard is not the most desirable occupation after all.

Laypeople believe they'll have no interaction with wizards and almost no interaction with magic (unless they're unlucky enough that a Lord would use up magic on them, but even still, it's hard to tell a magic-induced drought from a normal, really bad one.) Some laypeople who live far from castles, or in peaceful kingdoms where magic isn't often used, think stories of magic are exaggerations.

My protagonist is a princess who grew up close to an Eldertower, so she knows magic still exists. She has no idea that certain court wizards have been stealthily enacting their own wills, circumventing the Eldertowers' restrictions. She also has no idea that Eldertower spells aren't limited to natural phenomena; those spells are just the most popular ones. In fact, her own court's wizard has been claiming he's not yet ready to work magic, while secretly using a long-forgotten spell to turn dozens of maidens into swans. (I'm writing a Swan Lake retelling with a F/F romance.)

Question: Is there a single story, myth, or legend that most people in your world would be familiar with? What is it, and why is it popular?
 

lilyWhite

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Question: Is there a single story, myth, or legend that most people in your world would be familiar with? What is it, and why is it popular?

A common creation myth among the Outsiders is that of the Flower..as they call it in English, the human language they are familiar with. (When using said word, they'll pronounce it interchangeably as the plant and as one that flows.) The Flower is said to have travelled from world to world, planting a seed on each world. This seed grows into a great tree dwarfing the world itself, drawing life from the core of the world. Its seeds fall to the earth, and from those seeds emerge not only the flora of worlds, but the fauna itself, from lesser creatures to sentient beings. After it has shed its seeds, the tree dies; its bark, leaves, and branches all return to the soil of the world, bringing life back to the soil so that it may bear new life.

As to why it's popular? The Outsider world has numerous races that bear plant-like bodies and features, hence a common creation myth among them (because I keep thinking up plant/flower-people ideas...).


What creatures in your setting blur the line between animal and plant? Or are there any interesting relationships that exist between creatures and plant in your setting?
 

Will Collins

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Well, there are some plants in my series that suck out all the water from a person, including urine, which you could call a cross between leeches and lilies. :)

How many countries are in your world, and how do they differ from one another?
 

onceuponatime

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How many countries are in your world, and how do they differ from one another?

The world has recently experienced a lot of consolidation, and dozens of cities, tribes, and kingdoms have been consolidated into 5 key countries. The Southerners have formed a loose federation of city states, who have huge centres of learning and are very scientific (don't believe in magic), etc. and generate income from sea trade. The Mountains have one small remaining kingdom, after all the rest have been annexed by the Tietret, of fiercely independent and peace-loving forest dwellers. To the North, there are two competing magic-practicing factions fighting for control over the Ice Palace. The Red Wasteland is populated by the croissos, tough desert dwellers plagued by fights with temperamental witches. Finally, the kingdom that my story primarily takes place in is the Tietret, an alliance of ten kingdoms who have been aggressively expanding their borders. Some of the kingdoms were religious, but the Tietret are very secular and there is internal conflict around religion v secularism (with both sides opposed to anyone who claims to practice magic).

Edited to add the question! Where in your world is seen as a bad place to be from / to live? Why are people biased against it?
 
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Azdaphel

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Where in your world is seen as a bad place to be from / to live? Why are people biased against it?

Senow: A desert surrounded by high peaks and driest place in the world. There is not a drop of water there. Beings similar to insects live there and water is poison to them. Those who are sentient are hostile to anything from outside. It is not the rest of the world who is biased against it but its inhabitants who are biased against the rest of world. They believe they have been cast in hell and see any other beings as demons.

The Other Land of Darkness: First, my world is a parody setting. In some stories, you heard about people or places no one wants to name but have name nonetheless. So I have decided the most dreadful place of the world has no name since no one wants to name it. They only call it The Other Land of Darkness. It is a curse and corrupted place crawling with undeads. The biased is not against the country itself but undeads in general. When the God of Undead Insomnius was born following the multiplication of undeads, it provoked such a mess he agreed with the other gods to go somewhere else with his children. But some stayed behind and not necessarily because of nostalgia. Most undead lords in The Other Land of Darkness are evil/megalomaniac/hostiles/insane/sadistic or believe they must bring order and perfection to the world (pick whichever you like). Not all undead are like this, but prefer to stay in their land since the rest of world sees them as a potential threat.

Are there gods in your world?
 

Rufio

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Are there gods in your world?

You'd have to be a staunch optimist to think so. There are a few elderly vicars and priests still carrying the flame in their almost-abandoned churches. There's one intimidating cult that believes that the search for God was a red herring – it was always about the search for our own human omnipotence. And to them, that search ends with modern technology.

Here's my question:

What's the thing in your world that would most horrify an average person from our world?
 

starrystorm

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What's the thing in your world that would most horrify an average person from our world?

Hee. Hee. :evil

The aliens' human experimentation that's based around puppetry. Basically, you go to sleep and wake up a giant puppet. You're barely human, and your body is controlled from elsewhere.

What extreme sports are in your world?
 

DeleyanLee

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My world is a magical Pittsburgh in the year 2000, so all the extreme sports extant in our world are enjoyed there too, though there would be...twists because of magical abilities of the players--or the games themselves. Honestly, I haven't given that much thought to it since my story doesn't involve that aspect of life--though one of the minor characters is a big fan of All Things Black & Gold, but those aren't considered extreme sports.

What's the main thing that makes your world not our world?
 

Drascus

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My world is a magical Pittsburgh in the year 2000, so all the extreme sports extant in our world are enjoyed there too, though there would be...twists because of magical abilities of the players--or the games themselves. Honestly, I haven't given that much thought to it since my story doesn't involve that aspect of life--though one of the minor characters is a big fan of All Things Black & Gold, but those aren't considered extreme sports.

What's the main thing that makes your world not our world?

I could say magic but I feel like that's cheating. Actually the main thing in my world that is different is that queer people are not marginalized, weird, or unusual in any way. Some people prefer romance with people of the same gender. Or they like differing gender expression. It's not a big deal, and nobody would remark on it, from royalty down to the farm workers.

How do people travel in your world, and how accessible is travel over social classes?
 

DeleyanLee

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How do people travel in your world, and how accessible is travel over social classes?

In the series I'm developing, travel choices are by foot, by boat (lots of rivers and waterways) or, rarely by horse or chariot.

Chariots are restricted to the elite (kings, warriors, bards, negotiators) and are a symbol of their status. Since authorities travel through much of the land, they park their chariot in the town center or other public place to announce their presence so the people who need their help will know they're there.

Most merchants use boats to travel and transport, though carts to get to port are common. Horses are very rare and expensive, and there aren't really cattle/oxen in this world, so carts are hand-drawn, especially in the southern region where there's fewer rivers.

Inns are located every 10 or so miles along major roads because hospitality is a strong tenet in this culture. Inns are free to the traveler and maintained by the local king. (A king can be ousted if they're not maintained well.) Even if you're walking, you're covered.

​How is news spread in your world?
 

Blinkk

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Word of mouth is by far the most popular. News is spread mostly by travelers and traders going from town to town, picking up stories as they travel. It's an unreliable source of information of course, so you bet the author has fun manipulating miscommunications. Humans are great at making stories more dramatic, or misremembering details.

The upper class, who are literate, send letters to each other. This service is also a degree of unreliable as letters get lost, damaged, and delivery men/women don't always make it to their destination. When letters get sent, they're usually communication from the source, so this is a great way to communicate.

On a smaller scale, places of worship carry most news about local events. If you want to know about a current event, you'd travel to the local temple and ask if anyone there knows anything. The temples have a large role in making their communities better, so they have to keep up on current events.

What's a common pet in your world? Are there any pets that are status symbols?
 

DeleyanLee

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The world is ours, so all the pet options are the same as real life. However, because this is a magical our-world, only the rarest of people can have Boyets Warding Cats. Those are cats breed for millennia to protect their owners, physically and astrally, while they do major magic that leave them vulnerable. They choose their owners. Period.

How many races of the dominant sentient species inhabit your world?
 

Primus

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How many races of the dominant sentient species inhabit your world?

It's no different from Earth. All the races that inhabit this planet inhabit my fictional world as well. The dominant sentient species being humankind.

What's the etymology or inspiration behind your world's name?
 

armgrab

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What's the etymology or inspiration behind your world's name?

The world itself is just called "the world" or "Earth" (because it is technically Earth in the distant future). The nation in which the main story takes place is known as Kraetinia, and its name is derived from Keratin. All the countries in the world are derived from obscure parts of the human body. Other nations in this world include Pylor (Pylorum), Purkinji (purkinje fibers), and the Timpanic Isles (timpanic membrane).

What is your world's biggest government conspiracy, real or imagined?
 

TurbulentMuse

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This one's easy for me, the real one is that the government makes sure the majority of people never find out about real magic and monsters. The imagined conspiracy is the government covering up alien abductions. It's never aliens, most often it's the fae.

What's the weirdest thing that some people in your world consider normal?
 

HaldaneBDoyle

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What's the weirdest thing that some people in your world consider normal?
Almost nobody dies of old age or disease. Not because miraculous star trek level technology has been developed. That all faded into dust millennia ago. Even the idea of things like light-bulbs and batteries is barely remembered, even metal isn't necessary to support their comfortable existences. Instead it is normal for everyone to consume a soothing poison (carried in a bead around their neck at all times, their birthright to use whenever they see fit) and cull themselves at the end of their life, at the very latest once they pass reproductive age, often considerably sooner if they are not selected for reproduction. This is quite normal and not an occasion for sorrow. Living too long and suffering are seen as the real causes for concern.

What have the people in your world forgotten about their past?