A(Hopefully)Helpful Guide to the Creation of a Fantasy World

A Guide on Creating a Fantasy World for Role-play Purposes

Righty then, this is just my own personal set of guidelines I often follow on the creation of any world, within the fantasy setting, realistic, near present, futuristic and technological based worlds often follow a different pattern but ‘some’ rules can be applied across the board.

Contents: (Note, press ctrl+f and type any of the following to reach the correct section.)
What is a Fantasy World?
A few ideas to get started.
What to Keep in and what to Keep out.
Flora and Fauna
Races
Society
Religion or a Belief System
Magic

What is a Fantasy World?
A fantasy world, at heart, is to the point of view, many generally link a fantasy world to the ideas of dragons, shining knights and magic, a fantasy world needs none of those to be successful, in fact many bestselling books have opted out to follow that route and create their own setting for fantasy, whilst is often the accepted norm, it isn’t a requirement to include such things.
A fantasy world, can be a place where many boundaries in reality do not exist, time can be slow, there can be a direct line of good versus evil, things are black and white and often shades of gray are non-existent, but that’s a bad idea, which I’ll elaborate on later, in a fantasy world the first and foremost idea for creating one, is to consider medieval Europe, most people often base a fantasy world at that level of technology, Horses are used for transport of people, or goods, bandits are at large in the countryside waylaying travellers, there is a feudal and monarch system in place; it has the ‘feel’ for a fantasy setting, toss in some odds and ends which make it not the real world, and you’ll be started.
Now, back to the point of good and evil, in today’s world many people find such defining points, as dull, whilst it can give a motive for the roleplay, as in, we’re the good guys, let’s go kill that big evil dude and free the world, that’s.. too one track, now of course you can define a clear evil, it’s the evil guy sat on the black throne at the city of whatsitsname that rules over the rest of the world with a iron fist, BUT, there are a lot of gray factions in-between, there’s that shady guild which helped your roleplayers the previous day, but now they’re ready to put a dagger between your shoulder blades, creating this blur between good and evil can cause intrigue, it makes people on edge, it makes the story and role-play just that much more interesting. Now onto the dude on the black throne, now is he truly, just evil? Or is he a misguided soul that believes what he is doing is right? Would he repent or would he doom the world? These questions you need to ask yourself.
Whilst blurring the boundaries between good and evil is good, it can often cause confusion if it’s done too much, roleplayers may find themselves lost as what to do, they can fall behind or merely drop out of the whole thing, which is bad, the whole idea of making a fantasy world for roleplay purposes is to hold the interest of the roleplayers to keep them doing what they want to do, roleplay.

A Few Ideas To Get Started
Now here are a few things to think about, whilst not to the point, its things to ask yourself to make the whole process of making a world easier.
• Consider to yourself what kind of world you’re wanting, is it war torn and bloody? Is it a peaceful world now under threat? Is it innately evil with a bunch of ‘goodies’ fighting as a resistance? Is it going to be doomed or saved?
• Is magic going to exist, if so, how will it work? How do non-magic users treat it? More points of this further down in the magic section.
• What kinds of creatures inhabit your world? Do dragons exist, or do they not? Is the Orc and Goblin going to be your stereotype cannon fodder of the evil army? Once again, further notes in the Flora and Fauna section.
• Think what kind of races you want, do elves exist or were they all killed off in a war or some other great tragedy? Are dwarves by nature, if you have them, dwellers underground? Are humans your usual bunch? Once again, further notes in the races section.
• Is society stable in this world, or is it on the brink of collapse, is it unable to handle the plague affecting the land or is it unable to raise a standing army against the hordes of darkness attacking its borders?
• Noting the above, assuming the society of the world has an army, does It also have laws to follow? Is murder illegal, is it punishable with death?
• How ‘big’ is your world? Is it restricted to a kingdom, or is it the entire world?
• How does transport work in your world? Can characters zip about as they choose through magical gates, is flying permitted either by mount or magic? Is it all done on foot or horseback?
As you can see, the main point of this is to make you ‘think’ of what you want your world to be like, assuming you’ve done all of the above, you may have a vague outline of your world, but wait, there’s more, your now wanting to bulk it up, you feel you’ve got something to work with and you want it to have substance to use. So please, if you’re still interested, read onwards.

What to Keep in, and what to Keep out.
Now, you’ve got your outline of what you want, but obviously there are a few things to work with, this is mainly what to keep in, and what to get rid of, what may seem like a brilliant idea, will be a roleplayers worst nightmare, or taking it to a written book level, a readers migraine or sigh of annoyance, this is mainly, cliché’s, this can range from the dwarf who is only in the story for comic relief, to the snobby elf who always looks down on everyone else, we’ve also got the evil overlord who can only seem to conquer the world once he has this great item of magical importance, or vice versa, the heroes’ can only defeat him with said object. The main focus of this, is to filter out things which people have seen before, they’ve done, in your world, you want to be new, be fresh and be invigorating, the main problem sadly, is most ideas have been done, it’s hard to be original but good idea’s can still be used. Just a last few warnings though before I get to the good idea’s, don’t breach a book’s copyright, don’t steal names, don’t steal places, don’t steal obvious plot twists or plot elements, such as having Gollum in your story chasing the Halfling in your roleplay for his ring.

Now, the good things you can do, some which may be slightly contradictory with what I’ve just said, but still different.
• Read other peoples work, this includes roleplay and books, good ideas that work, can work in yours, this doesn’t mean to straight off copy it, but adapt it, it’s hard to explain but the principle isn’t to outright copy something word for word, or to merely change a name so it isn’t so obvious, if the main plot of a roleplay you’d seen revolved the major alliance of three cities in close proximity of each other, why not take it to yours as three countries, or nations? Why not simply make it the alliance three people made between them to fight evil? Things can be brought to different levels that can add a key element to the story you may have lacked.
• Stereotypes, whilst often bad, a few may be often kept, for example Orcs, the stereotype cannon fodder, the stereotype evil beasty who works in the enemy army, people are used to it, no one wants to have to get their head around the idea of Orcs being the wise intellectuals that control the world, It may of happened in that ‘one’ book you read, but it hasn’t in any other, at the end of the day people just want to sit back and roleplay, keep orcs as your dumb brute in the army, or make them smart, but keep them as that key role of being in the army of darkness, people are used to it.
• Have a ranging landscape, don’t keep everything as a lush green forest the entire way, nor the opposite, don’t be so overly diversing that people don’t know when they’re in the desert or arctic tundra.
• NPCs (Non-Player Controlled Characters), a good take on this in my experience, is if the author of the Roleplay, since he would obviously have the most insight into the direction of the story, or a trusted individual or two, controlled any and all NPCs, either in combat or merely dialogue, be varying with them as with the landscape, don’t make every NPC the same type where they merely point in a direction for the Roleplayers to go, likewise you’ll need at least a few if the roleplayers can’t figure out on their own where to go, this leads to a sub point.
- Making it so roleplayers don’t know where to go in a story is bad, it means you’ve left a key element in your world out, or you’ve confused them, that’s very bad, after you’ve written up your preliminary idea, from lore, a back-story or anything else, check it for plot holes, missing information or contradicting information, unless its intended, you need to fix these before you start.

Flora and Fauna
“What kinds of creatures inhabit your world? Do dragons exist, or do they not? Is the Orc and Goblin going to be your stereotype cannon fodder of the evil army? Once again, further notes in Flora and Fauna section.”
Was the previous point of this, consider it for a moment, we need to ask ourselves that to determine what will be in the world, now obviously, if you are unable to fill up a thousand page bestiary on every little creature, this also includes plant life, from trees to flowers and herbs, then you can easily use things from the real world, lions and tigers and bears oh my! Basically, what I’m saying is, the averages wandering mindless animals are ok, what this part is dedicated to, do dragons exist? Do they breathe fire? Are they good or evil creatures; what does the evil lord of darkness use in his armies? Tolkein-ish, does it have orcs, goblins and trolls? Or is it some creature you’ve spawned in the back of your mind such as the evil Pysdple (Blatantly me pressing letters at random right?), what do YOUR versions of Orcs, Goblins and Trolls look like? Are there any creatures that innately help the Roleplayers, what are the kinds of habitats of your creatures? Do they all live in caves where it’s dark; do trolls turn to stone in the light? The list goes on, the point being is any creatures you’re going to use a lot in your world, should have a little detail thrown to them, otherwise it will be very much the following, which I once said during a roleplay tabletop session.
“Several large, generic orcs, just like the ones you fought moments ago, attack you.”

....

Dull right?
Give your creatures life, give them personality, and give them eating habits’ too! Perhaps your roleplayers might stumble upon them in the middle of a feast.
Likewise on the plants side of things, say a roleplayer in your roleplay, his character is horribly injured, but can be saved by medicinal herbs, but do those herbs exist? If so, how and where do they grow? Do they clump up under trees? Are there herbs that are bad for them, even deadly? How available are they? Add a few plants, trees or anything else of importance to your list of information, it could prove useful later.


Races
Races, I’m keeping all the evil races, the things the roleplayers won’t roleplay assuming everyone is a ‘good guy’, so to speak, or girl, no offense meant, basically I’m keeping races such as orcs, trolls and goblins in the Creatures area, they’re creatures you smush under your mace.
When I say races, I mean things such Man, Dwarves, Elves, Halflings, Gnomes and so on and on, all the usual lot, this section is dedicated to them.
Is man your most common race, or is it near extinct and saved only by the grace of say, the Elves who control magic, are gnomes and dwarves digging into the earth for precious minerals and gems? Are they stereotype or not? Often keeping a stereotype for major races can solve you many issues, such as you not having to create an entirely new society or government system for them which will be covered further on. Here, it can be ‘ok’ to be stereotype, but please don’t copy the Tolkein Elf, or the Warhammer Dwarf, or the.. Well, you get the picture, use a stereotype but be individual at the same time; do Elves have any specific things that make them different to the other races bar their physical appearance? Which race lives the longest and would be said the most ancient and powerful? Your choice.

Society
Society.. woo.. this could take a while but I’ll try to keep it short, questions to ask oneself.
Is the society a monarchy? or is it a forum for all people within in, where they may express their wish to change the way things go, doing this will give you a social structure in which your roleplayers can work in, within this also lies the ideas of policing, are there any laws against murder or magic, assuming magic exists? Is it a tyrant state where the roleplayers may be hauled off to prison merely for expressing their thoughts?
More food for thought, does the nation have a standing army? If so, how big? Are the roleplayers likely to bump into it, either in good or bad ways? This leads to the next point.
Factions, as such we have the standing government, monarchy or otherwise, we have sub groups, we may have t he rogues guild, that do the dirty work for the King, we may have the magicians academy, we can have the cultists or the rebels or anything. The idea of having such factions, is to cause unrest for the roleplayers, they can’t become docile and settle down in the roleplay, because let’s face it; they could get a dagger in the back from someone who doesn’t like them.

Religion or a Belief System
Religion can always be tricky, it means making roleplayers and readers alike to have to understand a new rule set, a new pantheon of gods, but at the same time it can add interest, is a roleplayer going to have a character that is devout to his god to the point of murder? Or is there the atheist who thinks gods are just a pile of bull rammed down his throat as a child to keep him complacent?
A general idea, which is what I actually did myself, is read up on gods already in existence, either in fantasy or in the real world, a good example is the roman or Greek gods, there are ones defined by their role, the god of fertility, to the god of war, take specific roles, make a god, apply the idea to the god and there you go, one god done. Here is an example I have used myself in my world in the making, Aventime.

Aventime: Named after the world man dwells upon, or perhaps he named the world after himself, Aventime is the lord and ruler of all gods, the others bow at his presence, whilst individually he controls no specific aspect of the World, if he so chose to, he could turn all to dust, or stop death at his own whim. Aventime is also known as the Aventime the Father, or Aventime the Creator, for he created all life.
Aventime is often depicted as being of noble figure, clean shaven and in royal garb sat upon a throne, the image of a true king.

As you can see, I have given him his reason to be there, as the ‘Lord God’, my term for it anyhow, I have also given him a vague physical description, since you never know, and artwork, statues or anything else might pop up about the god.
Another idea, aside from Religion, assuming no gods exist, is say... the people worship the sun, because it grants them the light they revere so much, or they worship the land for allowing them to live upon it, where they ‘idolize’ something that actually exists. One idea is where the people worship the undying king as a god.. Well, because he doesn’t die.

Magic
Magic, is at heart chaotic in nature and appearance, the questions you seek to ask yourself as to how it will work, is it a gift at birth or something learned in time, is it a gift from a greater race? Is it non existant at all? How does it work? Is it done using ingredients or scrolls of power? Are items or enchanted objects needed? Are casting circles required before every spell?
Other questions to ask oneself is how magic is treated if it exists, do the public see it as common? Or is it flamed as heresy against the gods and magic users are burnt at the stake? Is there a common place of education such as an academy for it? Or is it done in secret amongst covens of sorcerers’ and sorceresses?


As you can see, my guide isn’t so much as taking your hand through every step, but prompting you with questions you can often ask yourself as to how YOU want YOUR world to be like, I cannot tell you how to make a world, only give you ideas and pointers on how to make your brain to make it.
I hope anyone who chose to read this found it helpful, if you have problems, disagreements or merely typos to point out, please comment, I enjoy feedback, good or bad in any way shape or form, as it gives me ideas on how to improve it, or future projects.
If people seek more specific information, rather than vague hints at things, please do PM or merely drop a post here, I’ll always be glad to help! I may make a more specific guide at a later date anyhow.

Guides Changes
Ver 1.0: Guide Posted.
Ver 1.1: Typo's fixed.

A Few Ideas To Get Started
Now here are a few things to think about, whilst not to the point, its things to ask yourself to make the whole process of making a world easier.
• Consider to yourself what kind of world you’re wanting, is it war torn and bloody? Is it a peaceful world now under threat? Is it innately evil with a bunch of ‘goodies’ fighting as a resistance? Is it going to be doomed or saved?
• Is magic going to exist, if so, how will it work? How do non-magic users treat it? More points of this further down in the magic section.
• What kinds of creatures inhabit your world? Do dragons exist, or do they not? Is the Orc and Goblin going to be your stereotype cannon fodder of the evil army? Once again, further notes in the Flora and Fauna section.
• Think what kind of races you want, do elves exist or were they all killed off in a war or some other great tragedy? Are dwarves by nature, if you have them, dwellers underground? Are humans your usual bunch? Once again, further notes in the races section.
• Is society stable in this world, or is it on the brink of collapse, is it unable to handle the plague affecting the land or is it unable to raise a standing army against the hordes of darkness attacking its borders?
• Noting the above, assuming the society of the world has an army, does It also have laws to follow? Is murder illegal, is it punishable with death?
• How ‘big’ is your world? Is it restricted to a kingdom, or is it the entire world?
• How does transport work in your world? Can characters zip about as they choose through magical gates, is flying permitted either by mount or magic? Is it all done on foot or horseback?
As you can see, the main point of this is to make you ‘think’ of what you want your world to be like, assuming you’ve done all of the above, you may have a vague outline of your world, but wait, there’s more, your now wanting to bulk it up, you feel you’ve got something to work with and you want it to have substance to use. So please, if you’re still interested, read onwards.

• As for the world I would think an even balance would be best. I mean an overly peaceful world can sometimes be boring to a writer, and a bit of a thrill or action is necessary. I also find, though, a story or world based around complete warfare and blood spilling is a little too much, I mean as much fantasy as a ”Fantasy” world is, you do use the norm of a modern day world. Also the matter of everyone is having a weapon/power. I admit, myself, I’d rather be a fighter then a peasant but the point of a writer and their character is to try out different skills. I think there should be some characters that are completely helpless. Say a farmer who only knows to thrust his tools at an advancing enemy because he has no training; or a poor house maiden or royal princess who has barely any knowledge in the use of weaponry and fighting. Another thing is love. Love is the most controversial topic for a roleplay on most boards. Most characters take a romance to an extreme or isolate themselves from the rest of the characters. I think a little romance wouldn’t hurt between characters as long as they aren’t isolated. I mean let’s face it, most people in the real world would not isolate themselves from their friends or events just because there love interest is around. I think Romance/love would be good in the world, just as long as it’s moderated throughout the roleplay.
• Like romance, magic is a dangerous ability to add to the rpg. It has to be monitored. You can’t have people over powering each other, god-moding, also most people tend to only pick a character with power (I admit again that I would probably be most people at times). I personally think Powers should not be apart unless it fits perfectly with the story line you want to achieve, also limit the power abilities, and the amount of people who hold them. Magic must be reasonable in a “Magical” world.
• I think creatures and races other then humans are great, just make sure there is an equal balance between humans and other races, and also that the races are relevant to your fantasy world.
• I think I’d like to see a basic amount of races, then have the rest extinct (no exception of a hidden race from the dwellers of those thought extinct)
• I think society should be very well off, at least before you bring it to the brink of destruction. Makes it easier for climaxes.
• Rules of a kingdom a must, and even some punishable by death. If you character dies because of something, you can always create a new one to come into the picture.
• The size of the world really does depend on where you want the story. If this is a fresh new story then I’d say make the world small. You can always come back with new history and a bigger world that could not have been heard of because the characters had no need to go to that particular place or know of that particular information.
• I think “zipping about” should be limited if not allowed at all. I like the story line of a struggle on a journey.

I fully agree on your points, but this isn't telling people how a fantasy world for roleplay should go, its giving them ideas on how to create their own, the fact being this isn't only limited to roleplay but story writing in general, I use these ideas as my own tools for creating things from D&D campaigns, to roleplay, to a novel i'm writing.

Although my points are referred to mostly the rpg world, I tend to use these points for my own personal writings. I figure what ever you write here (or any other rpg forum) should be a representation of your style, and it's almost like an example of what you would write on your own. I would personally use these points not just as an rpg format but for my own personal writings. Again these are just my thoughts and if you don't think they should apply, that's fine with me, I won't be offended. ^_^ I wish I could give you more opinion other then my points but I see your ideas fairly self-explanatory. ^_^

Hehe, thats my own point aswell, this is my general style I use for not only RPGs, but literary writings, as like you, these are my thoughts on how to provoke a person into creating their own fantasy setting and world, since everyone else obviously has their own ideals I won't tell them what to do, merely show them the way.

ha ha, that's fine to me, all I can say is I like the idea of this world and if permitted would join in a heart beat. ^_^ I encourage you to keep strong with this! ^_^