The Art of World Making

Dwarves language

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 05:32:39 GMT

Hey all. I'm not sure if I've mentioned this already but I've recently started my first conlang (constructed language) which is intended to be spoken by prehistoric dwarves. At the moment the language is currently based on various natralistic languages such as English, German, and Finnish with some borrowings from specific conlangs such as Klingon. The grammar is still in-complete but that is only because the conlang is still in it's early stages of it's development. The reason why I'm posting this here is because I was wondering if you knew of any sites that provided detailed information on Khuzdul -the dwarvish language in LOtR. I've tried a few searches through google but whilst I can find plenty of information abot the dwarvish culture I've yet to find much on their language. Even just some books on the subject would be useful. I would also like some information on any other dwarvish languages from books etc that you know of; and if possible, languages that you think might provide a basis of inspiration.

Trains!

Tue, 08 Jan 2008 07:18:20 GMT

http://www.privaterailcars.net/

http://patentroom.com/trains

Useful resources.

Community Info

Fri, 04 Jan 2008 19:13:04 GMT

I've asked this before (more than a year ago), cannot find the question or the answers so I'll ask again as I'm returning to our shared hobby...

What is the difference between this community and worldbuilding? I'm posting this over there also so I can try to get a concensus from both sides.

Also, I'll be working on a SciFi universe. Is there a prefered community for such endevors?

Thanks!

Geography invention resources?

Wed, 11 Jul 2007 07:26:11 GMT

I'm considering repainting a globe so that it maps out a realistic fantasy world that I could write stories about. The modified hypothetical-world globes made by Chris Wayan are inspiring. I have a globe that I can use, and it has some advantages over a map. It would be quite a nice decoration for a fantasy novelist's desk, if ever I manage to be a fantasy novelist.

However, I don't think that I have enough knowledge about geography in the way required for this type of project. I can point to such-and-such a country on a map, and I know what tectonic plates are, yes. I know that kind of geography. I just don't think I understand in enough depth about how land-features form that I could design original and yet natural-looking ones.

Pardon me if this has been asked before on this group, since fantasy maps are one of the main topics. What resources and references do you recommend that are of particular use to people designing fantasy geography?

D&D World Design Journal

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 20:05:46 GMT

Hi everyone, just wanted to let you all know that my D&D campaign design journal, orbis_terrarumis still going strong. Please feel free to have a peek and add to your friends list! Commentary is always welcome!

Psuedo Languages: Goblish

Thu, 01 Mar 2007 14:58:59 GMT

I call my second psuedo-language Goblish.

Translating from English to Goblish

P -> T	T -> Ch	Ch -> K	K, C, Q -> P
B -> D	D -> J	J, G -> G	G -> B
F, Ph -> TH	TH -> SH	SH, CH -> S	S, C -> F
V, F -> DH	TH -> ZH	J, Z -> Z	Z -> V
M -> N	N -> GN, NG	NG, N -> M
W, WH -> Y	Y -> W
L -> R	R -> L

QU -> PY

ST-> FK

U -> O

O -> I

I, Y -> E

E -> A

A -> U

Step 1: Remove all silent consonants (silent vowels stay in). "H" is dropped whether it is silent or not, except when it's part of a compound letter, such as "sh"). Turn all double letters (such as "ss" or "oo") to singles, and change "ck" to "k." For added effect, you can write in broken, barbaric sounding English.

Example:
"Me hunted bunnies last night" -> "Me unted bunies last nit"

Step 2: Replace all letters (or compound letters such as "sh") as shown in the Goblish transposition chart above. Note that some consonants are replaced by different letters, depending on the sound they make in the original word.

Examples:
"Me unted bunies last nit" -> "Na ongchaj dongef rufk gnech"
"city" -> "feche"
"cat" -> "puch"

Step 3: Pronounce the Goblish translation correctly. The vowels are pronounced "ah" "eh" "ee" "oh" and "oo." Most consonants make the same sounds as they do in English. The exceptions are "dh". which sounds like the "th" in "this" or "bathe," and "zh" which sounds like the "z" in "azure."

Example:
"Na ongchaj dongef rufk gnech" -> "nah ohn-chahj dohn-geff roofk ngech"

Some more examples of Goblish:
Ori (oh-ree) - Hello
Bijdwa (beej-dwah) - Goodbye
Yuch woi yungch? - What you want?
Bach rifk - Get lost
Na ucha woi - Me hate you

x-posted to fantasy_studies

Psuedo Languages: Gnomish

Wed, 28 Feb 2007 14:45:21 GMT

The first psuedo language I made, I call Gnomish.

Translating from English to Gnomish

P -> K	T -> P	Ch -> T	K, C, Q -> CH
B -> G	D -> B	J, G -> D	G -> J
F, Ph -> S	TH -> F	SH, CH -> TH	S, C -> SH
V, F -> Z	TH -> V	J, Z -> DH	Z -> ZH
M -> N, NY, NG	N -> M	NG, N -> N
W, WH -> Y	Y -> W
L -> R	R -> L

Qu -> SHW

U -> A

O -> U

I, Y -> O

E -> I

A -> E

Step 1: Remove all silent consonants (silent vowels stay in). "H" is dropped whether it is silent or not, except when it's part of a compound letter, such as "sh"). Turn all double letters (such as "ss" or "oo") into singles, and change "ck" to "k."

Example:
"I picked an apple last night" -> "I piked an aple last nit"

Step 2: Replace all letters (or compound letters such as "sh") as shown in the Gnomish transposition chart above. Note that some consonants are replaced by different letters, depending on the sound they make in the original word. "M" is a special case: it is replaced by "n" when it is the first letter of a word, "ny" if it is followed by a vowel, and "ng" otherwise.

Examples:
"I piked an aple last nit" -> "O kochib em ekri reshp mop"
"city" -> "shopo"
"cat" -> "chep"
"more" -> "nuli"
"amount" -> enyuamp"
"ample" -> "engkri"
"ram" -> "leng"

Step 3: Pronounce the Gnomish translation correctly. The vowels are pronounced "ah" "eh" "ee" "oh" and "oo." When two of the same vowel are together, treat them as a single vowel. Most consonants make the same sounds as they do in English. The exceptions are "dh". which sounds like the "th" in "this" or "bathe," and "zh" which sounds like the "z" in "azure." Most words are easily pronounceable as written, but in some cases, a minor sound is dropped. For instance, "viw" (they) and "wua" (you) are pronounced "vee" and "wah" respectively.

Example:
"O kochib em ekri reshp mop" -> "Oh koh-cheeb em ek-ree reshp mope"

Some more examples of Gnomish:
Iru (ee-roo) - Hello
Jubgwi (joob-gwee) - Goodbye
Fench wua (fench wah) - Thank you
Wuali yirchungi (wah-li year-choong-ee) - You're welcome
E ruzhi wua (eh roo-zhee wah) - I love you

x-posted to fantasy_studies

Psuedo Languages: Introduction

Wed, 28 Feb 2007 03:54:28 GMT

Final Fantasy 9 (I think it was 9. There've been so many) included a group of characters who spoke another language. But it wasn't really another language, just English with the letters jumbled. Throughout the game, you could learn the language bit by bit, by learning which letters were substituted with what. I thought it was a cool concept. The only problem was that the resultant text didn't look like a real language and was often impossible to pronounce.

It inspired me to develope a couple similar psuedo languages. They would be constructed in basically the same way, but the substitutions would be organized in such a way as to be easilly memorised, and so that the resultant text would have the appearance of a real language, and be pronouncable. I figured they would be useful to writers, to help give the impression of a world of many languages, for example, without having to go through the hassle of developing or learning a whole languages (or several) from scratch.

I've got two so far, which I will be posting about in greater detail in the next few days. I call then Gnomish and Goblish.

x-posted to fantasy_studies

Movin' my Worldbuilding

Sun, 25 Feb 2007 08:59:44 GMT

Just an FYI for those of you who've been following the setting I've been posting bits of here the last few years - I'm moving the new material off LJ and onto my own webspace. This both makes me a bit more comfortable in a legal sense - I was always a bit worried about LJ sticking in a Yahooesque "all your content are belong to us" clause - and it lets me manipulate it more conveniently, especially since I decided to work on it by setting up DokuWiki (which is idiotproof and a pleasure to use so far; I heartily recommend it to anyone doing similar projects).

I'll be some weeks in getting everything shunted over, not least since I'm taking advantage of the migration to do some substantial editing in parts, and get the Tap'annu and human halves of the setting lined up chronologically in particular (which is why there's few direct references to either, aside from the human timelines - which are gonna get rewritten to include nonhuman events eventually - so far). That'll be sooner rather than later, in any case. Bearing in mind that it's a work in progress, you can see it here in all its wikiality. The categories are blatant to-do lists; the list of links both working and non- are nowhere near comprehensive yet.

I'll probably still be pointing to new writeups here as I do them, but it's not something I'll probably keep up on readily. Between copying old notes in and writing new material, it's growing by several articles a day and will be for awhile, so excuse the huge gaps where no gaps should be by now.

For those who've been following it, there's small pile of new material, and a lot of it's interlinked with other stuff, so if you're curious, have fun!

Gods

Mon, 08 Jan 2007 11:26:37 GMT

Now I am not going to start with:

"Hello... I am developing my own world with lots and lots of text which I want you to look through for hours and hours and hours..."

Now I admit to be creating my own world, but I will not unleash it upon you apart from just to say that its an atypical fantasy setting which has Gods in it.

Rather I was curious about the role of Gods in some of your worlds, or at least those worlds which actually have Gods in them. Do they meddle in mortal affairs like the Greek Gods, just affect important events, or rarely interfere? Do you use Gods from real world mythologys or have you created your own? Is there one God or many?

Also if you use existing... well not existing... real world mythological Gods do you sometimes try and interpret them differently than other settings? I have a sympathy towards some Gods like Hades (forced into isolation in the underworld) and Loki (who admit it or not actually did a lot of good things despite being the trickster) so their characters are slightly different (though based upon) to what could be deemed the stereotypes.

New Worldbuilding Community

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 16:43:48 GMT

x-posted to several communities

You are invited to join asmaida, an exercise in shared world building, with some very basic role-playing elements. We are designing a modern-day island nation to be a setting for stories as well as an experiment in social and governmental design.

Please check it out, read the rules (first post), and share your ideas.

A Few Magical Thought Seven

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 03:22:15 GMT

At this point we'll be taking a short detour to consider magic items. The ever popular toys and tools so many adore.

Unfortunately, in the situation as we've got it set up, magic items don't work exactly as we think they should. The first problem is, as we have thinks set up, enchantments cannot be made permanent. That is, a magical property cannot be imparted to an object.

Let me explain. Magic can be used on things for a number of purposes. The first is to enhance or amplify a quality or property an item already has. Strength in the case of a steel beam. Another is to correct a flaw in an item. Such as mending a crack in a plate. Either can be done either by changing the item in question in some manner that produces the desired result, or by 'masking' or 'boosting' the item in question. Either because the desired property is not normally associated with the item, or the technician is a lazy slob.

An example of masking is making a diamond more durable. Diamonds are brittle, they are not known for their durability. To make it 'more' durable is to impart to it a quality it doesn't really have. To mask an item using magic one must make the enchantment permanent. Which, by the way our example universe works cannot be done. Therefor the magic has to be made self-sustaining and self-renewing.

You see, magic is a transitory effect. It can be used to create permanent change, but due to its basic nature it cannot be made permanent itself. Unless some way of making it self-sustaining and self-renewing is found any magic will have it's effect, than end.

This means that most enchantments are done to enhance an object. Making knives sharper or silk cloth softer, because those are properties intrinsic to those items. It is only when a property alien to the item is desired that "permanent" enchantments are used.

An example of this would be a hunting rifle enchanted to function as a GPS unit. Rifles do not function as GPS units in and of themselves. But with the right casting they can be made to function as GPS units. Thus the enchantment must be made self-sustaining and self-renewing for any hunting rifle to function as a GPS unit on a continuing basis.

There are no exceptions, and this sort of thing makes disrupting any sort of enchantment relatively easy once you know how. Thus most enchanters will put measures in place to protect against dispelling, keeping in mind the fact that such protections also require 'fueling and maintenance' and can be dispelled themselves.

Which brings us to our next post in this series, counters and deconstruction.

A Few Magical Thoughts Six

Fri, 29 Dec 2006 01:10:50 GMT

So how prevalent would magic be? More than you'd think. Given that most people would have some measure of magical talent, and how useful magic would be, you'd think all sorts of wonders would be found. However, there is a limiting factor.

That being desire. How important do most people see learning magic? Much as many of us bemoan the fact, the great majority of people put just enough effort into any endeavour as they feel necessary to get what they want. People tend to be happy with enough. Enough varying with how much effort it takes to get it. Somethings just aint worth all the trouble. But if somebody makes a something easier to get, then more people will try and get it.

Now consider magic as presented in this series. Magic takes effort. You have to expend energy to get what you want, and you have to know what you're doing. If you know more about what you're doing, you will likely pay less in energy to get it, but knowing means you have to put forth the effort to learn what you need to know. Again it comes down to a question of how much effort are you willing to put into getting what you want.

One could, of course, hire somebody to do it for you. But that comes down to a question of, is there anybody capable of doing it one can afford? If it takes more resources than a person is willing to expend, then a person does without.

What it comes down to is, the really minor stuff will be nigh ubiquitous. Harder stuff will be fairly common, if it's seen as vital to have. Crop protection magic for example. Or personal security. Parents with very young children would certainly be willing to spend for reliable protection.

More impressive magics would be largely restricted to those that benefit a number of people. Transportation and informational magics capable of handling a large number. Difficult magics affecting a single person or a small area or volume would be rare and far between.

So expect a lot of low powered magics most anywhere, a good number of medium powered magics in useful locations or doing useful jobs, and a rare few high powered magics in strategic jobs.

This, as you may expect, raises the question of magical items. Devices and objects enchanted to act in place of a spell or similar casting. Those we'll look at in our next post.

A Few Magical Thoughts Five

Thu, 28 Dec 2006 19:55:38 GMT

Now that we've had a look at what magic can do in our hypothetical situation, we need to take a look at just who can use magic.

The simplest route would be to say what everyone can. Almost as simple would be to say that only a very few can. The more realistic route would be a number more to the middle of the range.

The first thing to consider here is how useful magic is. In our scenario magic has been around since the beginning billions of years ago, and is capable of producing spontaneous effects. Indeed, there are animals that can manifest magical effects through innate talents. Since we're are a part of the natural world, why should we be any different?

The most likely possibility is that magic use is inherited. There are those with a genetic trait that allows learning and casting magical spells. But, how does the trait work? Is it a dominant trait, or a recessive? Will it manifest of it's own accord, or does it need some sort of activation. Can another genetic trait mask or suppress it? Is another gene needed for it to work to best effect? And what about the newly discovered inheritable RNA traits?

Then you have the new class of proteins that can affect how genes work. The old dominant/recessive gene paradigm has proven a tad too simple in recent years, there is really no reason to expect that any magic talent would be any different.

So our most likely scenario is that magic users tend to be born into magic using families, may have their talent triggered by some environmental effect, and under certain circumstances may have their trait blocked or otherwise suppressed by their environment.

That said, we do need to remember that we're talking about a universe where magic is useful. It helps make life easier, and so those who can use magic are going to be selected for in the grand game of reproduction. In clinical terms, magic use is reproductively advantages. Those who can use magic, even at the most basic level, will tend to be healthier, live longer, and get more babes or dudes. Any group with magic users among their number will do better than those who don't. Thus in the long run magic users will be preferentially selected. Even if magic talent is a recessive trait that requires a set of triggering events to activate, it will tend to show up more often than one might suspect. Much as Sickle Cell Anemia is more prevalent than one would expect, given the fatal effects of a full blown case.

So at the very least we're talking about a sizable minority of the population. If magic use is a dominant trait that manifest from very early in life, then just about everybody will be casting spells to one extent or another. Which raises a question; how prevalent is magic use, and how developed is it? But that's for the next post.

A Few Magical Thoughts Four

Tue, 26 Dec 2006 22:58:51 GMT

First a bit of business I promised in a comment on the last posting in this series. Namely, what do we call this magical energy we've been referring to.

Mana is a popular name. But it originally referred to presence. A man with great mana has presence. He stands out from the crowd. A man with mana has gravitas, charisma in the original sense. The same holds true for words such as vril, a word referring to personal magnetism etc. While orgone is just plain silly. So what do we call this magical energy of ours?

Well, about 20 years back or so one E. Gary Gygax coined a neologism, "heka". Pronounced 'hay-kah', it is derived from the Ancient Egyptian "Hekau" ('hay-kow') which means, "words of power". Gary coined heka specifically as a name for magical energy, so that's what we'll call our magical energy.

With that out of the way we can go on to consider the question; what can magic do?

Here real world thought is a real help. In real world magical practice magic is attempted to make life better for the practitioner or his client. Better hunting, fertility, good crops. Magic has been tried even in research labs, though most lab workers would deny this. So in our case we could use magic for most anything. With one caveat; there are limits.

It comes down to a matter of how much heka (see above) a person can safely use. And how efficiently he uses it. Combined with how much heka it takes to affect the desired change. A large change would take more heka than a series of smaller changes that taken together produce the same result. So, depending on talent, ability, education, and experience what one could do with magic would vary. Most practitioners would be able to do little, a few much, but in the long run, with planning and a good working knowledge of art and theory most anything should be possible.

Though there will always be some things that just can't be done. These being those effects that require more heka than anyone is able to handle, or which are too complicated to realize. Though one should never underestimate a human's ability to come up with an easier way of doing something.

So it comes down to a question of, what do you want to do?.

And how do you want to do it? But that opens up a whole 'nother packet of annelids.

Take, for example, better crops. How do you make that happen? Improve health? Tweak the weather? Perhaps ward the crops from pests. Maybe somthing that combines all those and more, though that would make the magic more difficult to carry off.

So the answer to our question is, anything you need within reason. The more a culture knows about how magic works, and in how it can be used to change the world, the more that can be done with magic.

But, with this very important limitation caused by the fact we're considering an alternity like our own. You can't change the nature of the universe itself. You can change the shape, but you can't change it's basic nature. That is, you can't change a science based universe into a magic based universe. Other than that, based on your innate intelligence, skill, heka you can utilize, and a few other factors, you can go nuts. But always remember that when you do pull something outrageous, there will be consequences.

Up next - for real this time, who can use magic.

A Few Magical Thoughts Three

Mon, 25 Dec 2006 12:03:16 GMT

A change in plans here, I forgot the essential order of things, so you're getting an essay on what magic can do instead of who can use magic. This is a subject in which the order in which the parts are presented does matter.

So now that we're back on track we can consider the vital question: What can magic do?

Many see magic as being able to do most anything. Some see it as wish fulfillment. There may well be alternities where this is true. However, we are considering an alternity that is very much like ours, but for the presence of working magic. In such a realm there are limits to what anything can do, and there's not damn thing you can do about it. Yes, a nuclear weapon can produce a prodigious amount of energy. However, such devices require an advanced science, an equally advanced technology, and a lot of fiddly bits. Just putting together the infrastructure necessary to support the industry necessary to produce an atomic bomb is beyond most country's capabilities, much less that needed to support a hydrogen bomb manufactory. The same constraints will apply to magic.

The biggest limitation will be that caused by knowledge. How much have people learned about magic? What do they know about how it works, what it can do? What do they know about manipulating magic? Using magic to manipulate other forces and matter itself? What have they thought of doing with magic? What have they done with magic?

What do they know of the phenomenon, of magic itself? How much do they know of how it works, and how life makes use of it? To what degree have they refined their techniques? Have they invented new techniques that use magic more efficiently?

Then there are the physical limitations. To what degree can magic be manipulated to produce desired results? If magic uses its own type of energy - separate from gravity, electro-magnetic, weak force, and strong force, how much of that energy can a person handle at any one time? Can this energy flow through conduits of some sort, or must it be through a living subject of some sort? To what extent does it impact the user, and how does use impact the user? In a world like ours those are important questions.

To simplify our metaphysics (already complicated enough) let's assume that magic has its own force. Very early on in the history of the universe tied in with the other four, but under normal conditions separate and distinct. There are specific conditions under which it can be converted from another form of energy, but that takes energy. That is, effort. There are situations and conditions under which it can be produced naturally. But such are hard to arrange, and most often aren't very productive.

Then there's the matter of getting the energy from the point of production to where you need to use it. Having billions of ergs of magical energy at one spot does you no damn good when you need it a mile away, and you have no way of transporting it. It would still be useful, but the users would have to go to the source, instead of the energy produced by the source coming to them.

Fortunately we do have a solution. First off most people think of magic energy as being a lot like electro-magnetism. It produces a field, it flows through conduits. You touch a live "wire" you could get a nasty shock. For our pupposes I think we can give it a positive and a negative charge. Certain materials are better at conducting this energy than others, and so can be used as wires and cables to transport the energy to wherever it's needed.

But, there will be limits on the rate of flow. That is, on how much magical energy a conductor can carry at a time. For the life of me I can't recall what the other measure of flow is for electrical current, but I do know that one is known as "volumetric". Volumetric Flow is why those big transmission lines are made of thick cables of aluminum. At that scale you can transport more electricity than you can with copper cables of the same overall dimensions. But at the scale of household wiring copper is a better conductor than aluminum, so we use copper in our homes. Physical laws being generally applicable, the same considerations apply to magical energy. Some "wires" do better with volumetric flow, other "wires" with the other type.

Now we get to the question of what magic can do. Which is a matter of how can magic be used, and how much effort is needed.

Which we'll take a look at in part four.

A Future History of Humanity: The Administration of Man

Mon, 25 Dec 2006 06:14:46 GMT

Hey all; a very [insert culturally-appropriate adjective] [insert culturally-appropriate chronological reference] to all. (See, it can't be Christmas. It's 10C out. It's raining. I refuse to believe this is December. It is now October 86th or something.)

I've been fiddling with my setting's background some more after coming up for air from a couple of months actually writing fiction in it, and I've been coming back to the human parts of the setting a lot lately. The Future History I've been working on here for the past, well, long time isn't exactly complete, but it's starting to get to that point.

There's two large periods I planned to outline. The first is the one most of my materials here have been intended for, particularly the timelines and the character biographies I've done so far. The second segment I haven't mentioned much of anything for here yet; it's considerably after the first bunch of stuff, because of a period of collapse and reconsolidation which kind of puts things on hold for awhile.

The first period of the Future History ends with one of the nastier human government, the Administration of Man, which I first alluded to (gods) almost three years ago with this post quoting one of its founders, and mentioned some more in one of the biographies posted awhile later (Paxman's, in that case). Since the timeline's getting up to the point where I'd be handling the Administration's chunk of history in considerable detail, I figured I'd hit the comm with a writeup about them to at least give the broad outline before I start figuring them out in detail.

Mind you, this was written in a late-night haze, so as usual it could probably do with some editing.

The Administration of Man (July 2554-October 2714 CE) was the third human government which completely unified Earth, and the first to make a serious attempt to unify all of humanity under a single flag. A “temporary” military government which evolved into a wide-reaching and complex institution, the Administration managed to embody the highest and lowest points of human history within its history. During its height, humanity reached its apogee of power, wealth and influence, but its collapse nearly brought about the extinction of the species.

At first, the Administration was an ad-hoc affair. The surprise explosion of the Yellowstone supercaldera in July 10, 2554 managed to decapitate much of the executive and legislative branches of the Pan-Terran Republic's federal government, to say nothing of plunging vast swathes of North America into chaos or worse. After two days of the remaining civilian government's failed attempts to restore some semblance of order to the deteriorating situation, the Republic's armed forces stepped in. On July 12, Continental General Philippe Lemarchand issued a declaration on behalf of the JCS declaring martial law, and announcing the formation of “an emergency, interim administration over the Earth's surface” to coordinate relief and recovery efforts. The announcement was welcomed by the populace.

The administration worked efficiently: over the days and weeks which followed, hundreds of thousands of people were rescued, relocated or provided with aid, a process which only accellerated as assistance from the colonies and other Council races arrived. While true recovery would be a matter of decades, the physical, humanitarian and climatic damage was contained within six months. By that point, however, several of the administration's senior officers began to feel comfortable in their positions of authority (despite, it seems, genuinely wishing to play Cincinnatus rather than Caesar in the first place), and the idea of holding elections for a new executive and legislature kept getting postponed “briefly.”

Open opposition within the military itself began as a number of civilian protests against military rule were suppressed in early 2555. A period of behind-the-scenes infighting between these officers and a pro-democracy faction, itself led by General Lemarchand, quickly resulted in a purge. Several senior officers were killed, and many others discharged or sentenced to house arrest. By the spring of 2555, Fleet Marshal Uchechukwu Oshodi and Continental General Bui Quang Minh had secured the military's power over both the civilian and military populations. The Administration – which began referring to itself with a capital A after this point – had ceased to become an “interim” body. It would reign for the next one hundred and fifty-nine years.

After its control of Earth was solidified, a process which took a few years, the Administration claimed authority over all Terran colonies – including the independent ones – which ignited a protracted civil war. As the dependent colonies relied on the PTR military for protection in the first place, and the independent colonies had negligible armed forces, many of the human worlds fell quickly. Centres of resistance prolonged the fighting, however, and a massive, surprise intervention by the human/transhuman component of the thinly-spread Cloud civilization nearly toppled the military government. Coordination and resources won out, however, and the Administration emerged, albeit battered, as victor and sole ruler over most of human space.

Rendered paranoid by their near-defeat, the Administration embarked on a massive militarization program, both to maintain its power base and as a genuine desire to protect against any future threats. In a short time, Earth became first one of the most powerful members of the Council, and then the most powerful member by far. Remaining extrasolar colonies, and several Cloud holdings, fell one by one. The secessionist Association's successful bid for independence – punctuated by the loss of three Administration task forces at Breen's World and Newstrom's Landing in 2578 – finally brought an end to the civil war. However, by this point the Council races, concerned at growing xenophobia and militarism coming from Earth, began to attempt to contain the Administration's influence in concert. This failed disasterously, resulting first in a decade-long standoff, and finally open war with Earth's former allies. Again, the vastly expanded, experienced human forces won out over their less-prepared neighbors. Through a series of conflicts finally ending around 2620, the Administration defeated and conquered each of the Council members. In the wake of the War of the Council, the Administration began to refer to itself more specifically as “the Administration of Man.” A final surge of expansion outwards, ostensibly to create buffer zones should the Administration encounter any other large polities on the frontiers, came to a gradual halt by mid-century, as the military realized it could not chew much more than it had currently bitten off. Recognizing it was beginning to overextend, the leadership decided that enough was enough, and declared a moratorium on expansion for the indefinate future.

The Administration imposed significant restrictions on starflight access for each of its subject races, but otherwise ruled them with a comparatively light hand. After all, only a portion of humanity was still under arms, and the entire species was outnumbered by the subject races roughly thirty to one, and the less adventurous elements of the leadership lived in fear of uprisings too large for the Fleet to easily contain. Uprisings which did occur, however, were put down swiftly and often with more violence than necessary, as a “message” to would-be imitators.

Human citizens of the Administration, however, were very well-off. Even civilians – who still held no power in the government unless they enlisted, and the Administration astonishingly remained a volunteer military through the twenty-seventh century – enjoyed high status, although they continued to live under an authoritarian regime which guaranteed them only a limited range of rights. Large amounts of trade goods, manufactured equipment, and raw materials flowed into all of the human worlds. Earth itself spent much of the high era of the Administration as a garden world, the hub to which most goods eventually arrived, its industrial concerns moved into orbit or closed altogether to allow the environment to heal. Featuring unprecedented wealth, comfort and stability, Earth became a paradise, serving more as an administrative and cultural hub to the entire empire than anything else.

Humanity's position was neither tenable nor stable, however. From the moment it reached its height, there were figures within the Administration who didn't merely suspect but knew that eventually human dominance would falter, either by choice or by force. Much of the internal politics of the Administration after 2680 centred around a peaceful power struggle between a more traditional, authoritarian camp which believed power could be maintained indefinately, and a reformist movement which saw the Administration's fall coming and wished “to fold rather than shatter” by managing Earth's decline as gently as possible. By the turn of the twenty-eighth century, the reformists were almost in a position to implement their policies as their ideology secured six of the twelve High Marshals in charge of overall Administration policy. Unfortunately, events began moving quickly indeed before they could effect much change.

A catastrophic first contact with the Tap'annu Hierarchy in 2703, in which Administration fleets were routed in a border war in Cestra and Sundari space, highlighted the vulnerability of the regime. As Peshuan fleets moved to annex several disputed Administration-held systems on their frontier, several of humanity's subject races rose up in open revolt, expelling or exterminating their human garrisons. The human military, fending off the Peshuan invasion on one frontier and attempting to fill a hole caused by the losses at the hands of the Tap'annu at the opposite end of its space, was incapable of policing the entirety of the Administration's territory at once. Several outlying races managed to liberate their former holdings and began to prosecute a general war with Earth. The war which resulted became known as the Fall of Man.

The Fall took eleven years to play itself out, superior Administration firepower and discipline turning the war into a slow, grinding retreat. Terrible reprisals were enacted against human populations on liberated worlds, which resulted in retaliations by Administration forces, and the worst fears of the reformist faction were realized when the rebels, who had by this point organized themselves into a new body called the Parliament of Sapients, declared the seizure of Earth itself to be the ultimate goal of the war.

By 2714, only Sol and a handful of other systems remained in human hands, with several others reduced to smoking moonscapes. The ranking Administration commander at the time, Michael Paxman, had been a member of the reformist movement; as the war continued and its ferocity increased, though, he began to fear that the Parliament intended to exterminate the human species outright, and prosecuted the last stages of the war as though that were the case. By his death in October, in a symbolic last stand at his bunker complex beneath Cairo, there was little left to fight over. Between extensive orbital bombardment and drawn-out ground fighting, Earth was left in ruins, its skies choked with ash. The remaining worlds surrendered or fell within weeks, and human power in the region had come to an end.

Fewer than one in five humans survived the Fall of Man, many of whom lived in the Association or Pearcean worlds which had remained aloof from the Administration through most of its existence. The survivors lived as a pariah species for centuries afterwards. The Edict of Cairo, declared by the victorious Parliament, placed the surviving human populace under military occupation for two centuries, and forbade human worlds from unifying with one another under a single government indefinately. Many considered human history to have ended after the Fall of Man. More appropriately, it was placed on pause for almost three hundred years, until the work of Amar and a handful of others brought about a renaissance, laying the foundations for the eventual Redemption under Tessema several centuries later...

A Few Magical Thoughts Two

Mon, 25 Dec 2006 00:23:32 GMT

Okay, now that we've laid out (and broad terms) what we're trying to do here, let's go on to consider another question.

First; what is magic?

Here we run into a few problems. For one thing, people aren't going to agree on the matter. The best we can do here is establish what magic is for our purposes. For another, most any definition or description of magic we can devise could also be applied to more mundane ways of doing things.

Still we need a baseline. So here's an inadequate attempt that's sure to satisfy few, but it's better than the alternatives.

Magic: The ability to shape the world in accordance with one's will, utilizing a special ability and a special connection to reality that is unique to itself. Which, furthermore, does not require any physical connection other than those needed for affecting the effect.

(I can hear the quibbles now. :) )

It's clumsy, it doesn't satisfy me, but it is better than anything else I can come up with. It' a case of something you can't really be more precise about without a phenomenon to futz around with. It also gives us that all important baseline. What are we talking about when we speak of magic. For the purposes of this exercise it is the description given above. I know others will (often vehemetly) disagree, but here we'll stick with what we have.

The good reader does need to understand that we are dealing with a type of magic that might exist in a reality such as ours. Testable, verifiable, falsifiable, learnable. A magic that is scientifically rigorous, which I'm sure alienates a fair number of people in the world. So mote it be. There's an old military adage, you try to defend everything you'll end up defending nothing. So keep in mind that we are now talking about magic as you may understand it, but about magic as it is understood in our imaginary world. We are, after all, talking about magic as it might work in a world such as our own. And about magic as it might have impacted our world had it existed from the very beginning.

(I know, but we do need to establish the base conditions before we can really get going on this. Maybe someday a smarter descendent species will find a better way of saying all this. But I think they're going to have to be a whole lot smarter than us.)

Next time, who can use magic.

A Few Magical Thoughts 1

Sat, 23 Dec 2006 22:07:09 GMT

I don't think anybody's posted to this in awhile. Now here I come to post about something a tad offbeat. Here now I present the first in a haphazard series on what magic might do in a world where it has always existed.

We'll start with looking at the question of just what magic is. To do that we'll first need to acknowledge one important item. That being, magic doesn't work in the real world.

How do I know that? Well first, if it did work we would agree on what it is. We don't. Some say magic is this, others say magic has to be that. We can't agree on what magic is because we have never seen magic used in any observable, verifiable way. We get claims and assertions, but nobody has yet demonstrated magic in any manner that can be tested.

We also know that magic doesn't work because it has no effect on the world. Belief in magic has an impact, but not magic itself. Not even love charms and money spells. 'Bout the only thing a love charm is give the caster the confidence she needs to say hello to the guy she's interested in. Any other way of giving her the confidence she needs to take the initiative would work as well. I'm talking about results that cannot be replicated using any other method, and physical results too.

So we need to agree on what magic is for our purposes. In addition, we need to decide on who can use magic, and what it can be used for.

Now for this series we'll be going with a world much like our own. The Sun shines by nuclear fusion, dynamos produce electricity, and cats are strange. It is, in other words, a scientific world, a world that makes sense. It is a world that can be understood, and that understanding taught to others. It is a world where understanding can be improved as more is learned about the world. In short, it's our world, only with magic.

So what sort of magic would our kind of world produce? That's for next time.

I'm just curious...

Thu, 02 Nov 2006 00:29:50 GMT

When you're creating a world to write or roleplay in, how many of you pay attention to the placement of real-world climates, biomes, etc? Do you take into account ocean and wind currents when trying to place geographical features such as grasslands and deserts? Or is it just me being overly anal retentive, trying to build a logical and scientific framework to why forests, tall-grass praries, short-grass praries, etc are where they are?

I mean, I find it all really fascinating, but DAMN is it making my brain hurt.

Wed, 11 Oct 2006 18:06:49 GMT

I don't know if any of you have heard of, or are players on Eshraval.com. It's an attempt at creating a realistic alternative world with a contemporary culture, ie not fantasy or scifi. There are a few conworld projects around but Esh seems to be a lot more about the conculture, politics and story development side of things whereas most are about simulated economics and wargames. The main site is for the registry and simulation, but probably the interesting stuff is it's wiki, the Eshralopedia.

Anyway, my nation is called Nova Esperia, a tropical Fascist dictatorship. Personally I have some problems with the way the "game" side of it works, but I thought other people into worldbuilding might find it interesting.

And Touch the Face of God

Sun, 08 Oct 2006 17:20:55 GMT

I just finish Ken Hite's Suppressed Transmission: The First Broadcast, and I'm now reading his [b]Suppressed Transmission: The Second Broadcast[/b] (both from Steve Jackson Games). As I'm reading the various arcane (as in strange, mysterious, and hidden) goodies Ken presents for your RPG scheming an idea comes to me. LJ posts on starting points for RPG campaigns. Starting points that take our mundane world and change them. But instead of using a boatload of stuff as Ken does, use one item.

This post starts with a news item I ran across a few weeks back. I think in Scientific American. A report on a study done using psilocybin, the psychoactive ingredient in "magic mushrooms". According to the study those who took psilocybin were more likely to have experiences of a spiritual or religious nature than those who took the placebo, ritalin. It was also noted that psilocybin cas also more efficacious in relieving symptoms of clinical depression and generalized anxiety disorder.

So inspired by Mr. Hite, and fueled by my rather active imagination, I present to you the following essay:

The year is 1962. The Western World faces dangers unimaginable in previous times. The Free World and the Communist World face each other across a nigh uncrossable chasm of paranoia and hostility, the threat of nuclear armageddon hangs over the heads of billions, and country-western music of execrable quality dominates the radio. Then there's the Cuban Missile Crisis. No one in America feels there is any chance the young, hapless President Kennedy can stand up to the wily Party Secretary of the Communist Party of the U. S. S. R., Nikita Krushchev. Is it any wonder suicides and hospitalization of severe depression have sky-rocketed?

The situation is desperate. At least there are those in power who think so. But Western medicine has little to offer. No drugs other than MAOIs (who have serious problems of their own, just ask diary farmers) that show any efficacy against the disorder, and shock treatment (as it's inaccurately known) requires special equipment, special training, and has side-effects almost as bad as MAOIs.

Enter psilocybin. A "banned substance" officially, but one studies performed by the CIA and Naval Intelligence indicate could be eficacious against depression. The reported religious experiences are considered a good thing, in-so-far as they might lead people back to the loving arms of God.

The FDA is shown the study results, a few arms are twisted, and soon the major pharmaceuticals are releasing prescription medications for clinical depression under names such as, Sunrise, Cheery Morning, and Fields of Heaven.

Not all are helped. A few are even made worse. But for the great majority of sufferers from major depression the new psylocybin based medications are a Godsend. The suicide rate plummets, man-hours lost to severe bouts of depression drop. Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable submit bravura performances in The Wild Ones, for which they will both win the Academy Award for best Actress and Actor respectively. The Soviet Union initially dismisses all this as signs of the coming collapse of the decadent West, but soon enough Soviet psychiatrists are dispensing knock-off versions, and shifting boxes into the underground economy to supplement their inadequate state salaries.

And not just in the Communist Block, and not just the medications. The fungus psilocybin is extracted from see an explosion in popularity. Often despite it's reputation for lack of quality assuarnce, and sometimes because of that lack. It's natural and all that buzzword stuff after all.

It's a honest to God miracle according to the news media. Until, that is, true miracles start to happen.

That's the starting point. The year is now 1970. Miracles and wonders, while not exactly common, are all over the place. In addition magical talents and magic workers are popping up; while strange beasts and malign spirits roam the land, and gods of ancient times and modern are booking Las Vegas solid. And just last week the National Brotherhood of Vampires (NBV) held a march on Washington to demand voting rights for the deceased. A move supported by the Democratic Party in the city of Chicago, Illinois.

What sort of world would this be? How would people handle the sudden influx of the arcane, otherworldly, spiritual, or even divine into a once mundane existence? How long before the Greys show up to complain about the hermetic noise and pollution?

And how did the lich Leonard of Venice wind up in South Philly anyway?

It's a time of transition, a time of change. It's a time of new opportunities and new perils. But mostly it's time our heroes, the PCs, knuckled down and helped get things straightened out. At least in time for the first episode of season five of Soul Trek, the popular ongoing saga of Captain Kirk of the spiritship Enterprise; his first officer, the wizard, and reformed demon Mr. Spock; the shamanic healer "Bones" Mccoy; and the rest of the Enterprise crew.

This one is going to need some research on my part. I'd welcome ideas on where to start.

Thu, 05 Oct 2006 17:27:36 GMT

Cross-posted to little_details and rpg_design as well as my personal journal.

I'm writing a science fiction novel which is set a few centuries after a devastating series of events, some of which are population growth related, nearly wiped out civilization. There are vast regions of the planet which are uninhabitable, and even more which are unpleasant and dangerous. At the same time, there is still lots of arable land. Especially given that Earth now has a fairly constant, sustainable population of somewhere between 300 - 600 million people, and an inclination to keep it that way. Population is stabilized by a number of factors, including a perception of low infant mortality, societal pressure, and a 'release valve' of extraterrestrial frontiers for those who don't like the way society is being run.

Earth is a center both of high technology and of food production. It is an economic powerhouse (because the colonies within the solar system are partially to wholly dependent on it for food), and depleted resources are supplied by importing from off planet sources.

I'm trying to get a picture of what population density would look like. How big would a large city be? How sparsely populated would (fertile) rural areas be?

As far as I can tell, the worlds population was in this range between the 14th and 18th centuries, but that's not quite enough data to figure it out. Food production per capita needs to be higher than it was historically (to produce excess for export), but farming techniques and equipment will be such that there would be a higher yield both per acre of land and per agricultural worker. Factories and centers of production would likewise be more efficient.

Any suggestion of a starting point would be appreciated.

The Suspiciously Convenient System

Thu, 07 Sep 2006 23:23:41 GMT

I came up with a worldbuilding post I'm sure you'd all be interested in - and managed to post it to my own journal by mistake. Comment either here or there, whatever you prefer.

Brainstorm request: deep-future wonders

Sat, 19 Aug 2006 06:56:44 GMT

Awhile back while fiddling with various parts of my setting which you've all seen plaguing this community, the phrase "the Twelve Wonders of Man" jumped into my head, jammed a series of spikes deep into my hindbrain, and welded itself firmly in place, never to go away.

I've got ideas for three of them so far; the problem with this is that twelve is a larger number than three, and I'm going to be moderately stumped until the whole thing gets finished. So I'm calling for brainstorm ideas for the remaining nine Wonders of Man.

What qualifies? Well, think of original seven as a kind of starting point. I'm basically looking at things that people would look at and go "...good lord," kinda like how a lot of people would react today to seeing the Burj Dubai completed (and indeed, one of the three I've got so far is inspired by that; I'll probably have writeups on all three later). I'm working with a spacefaring culture several centuries down the road - FTL, large-scale space colonization, space elevators, etc., are common, so there's room for significant wackiness.

Anyway, ideas don't have to be very specific, or even directly connected to the setting's canon in any significant way (I imagine only a few of you are paying that close attention anyway ;) ). If people are poking at anything in the canon, these would be current as of 2700 in the Future History posts, and at least some of them would be a couple of centuries old by then.

I'm basically looking for broader ideas - concepts, vague, half-formed imagery, starting points for actual fleshed-out ideas.

Thanks for anything you guys can inflict!