I'm worldbuilding a strange, semi-alien land. Help out and get 5 xp

[PerishedFraud]

eat the sludge.

[Rhedyn]

Sentient rocks. They don't move, eat, talk, or are really noticeably alive. But if you step on one or break one, they send out a wave that signals help to Earth aligned creatures in the area that come rushing to attack the party. They reproduce by sending microbes into adjacent rocks, but they need the heat and sunlight to live so the whole species lives on the surface. They are great philosophers and will produce water is asked nicely of struck.

[Segev]

Ice trees. These strange denuded trees grow in lands that are always colder than their surroundings. Their branches are always covered in ice.

In truth, the branches are roots, and they suck heat out of heir surroundings to fuel the processes other plants use photosynthesis to achieve. The ice is their water supply.

[AlignmentDebate]

15 foot long sandworms are a playable race.

[comk59]

Sky Whales. Massive, partially serpentine, peaceful creatures that soar through the sky, filtering out the ambient magic of the world for sustenance.

Tragically rare these days, as their magic saturated blood is an incredibly powerful alchemy and spell reagent.

[farothel]

a plateau where there's Always sun and a lot of gems are present. Should the players take any away from the plateau they will melt away in a day.
The 'people' there are like golden, glowing ghosts, not visible at first. Only if the players stay on the plateau long enough will they become visible and if they stay too long they become like those people as well (saves are probably a good idea to prevent this from happening).

I've taken this from Exalted 2nd edition. If you want strange creatures and locations, take a look in the various source books of that game. There are a lot of strange things in Creation.

[Segev]

The land is actually floating on the oceans. It’s mostly unnoticeable, except that the land masses don’t have fixed relative locations.

Deep below the waves, it becomes clear that the land masses are shedding something thicker than water to the ocean floor below. The great whales of the seas are flying monsters to the races that dwell on the ocean floor the way he races of the land dwell on the floating islands.

[PerishedFraud]

What I'm getting from these recent posts is whales are welcome everywhere.

[Segev]

What I'm getting from these recent posts is whales are welcome everywhere.

Due to our land-bound nature, sea creatures, particularly of the depths and/or large ones, tend to be alien and neat to our perspectives.

[TheStranger]

The land is actually floating on the oceans. It’s mostly unnoticeable, except that the land masses don’t have fixed relative locations.

Deep below the waves, it becomes clear that the land masses are shedding something thicker than water to the ocean floor below. The great whales of the seas are flying monsters to the races that dwell on the ocean floor the way he races of the land dwell on the floating islands.

Of course, the ocean floor is actually floating on the ocean below that and shedding something even thicker...

It's floating continents all the way down (and up).

[Lord Arkon]

First idea - The world is alive, and still growing. The natives know the general areas where growth events occur, and have learned the dangers of building near them. When a growth event occurs, the land splits, and material from the elemental planes is drawn in, mostly matching the original makeup of the land around it (mostly). This does not expand constructions, even ones of natural stone, which are likely to crumble as their foundations pull apart. Simple plants may be drawn as well, from whatever plane makes sense for the campaign cosmology.

Sometimes, elemental beings and energies are drawn in with the material; the beings may explore or lash out blindly, while the energies may 'taint' or 'imbue' native lifeforms, giving them an elemental template. Growth events can range from a few inches, to several miles, with larger events being told in legends.

As an alternative, the new material can be drawn from primordial chaos, and slowly assimilated by the surrounding environment.

Second idea - Space in this dimension is more malleable than what we know. The world and its inhabitants have grown to incorporate spacial folds into their being. Traveling in the world means accounting for locations where a step could take you to another continent, and the natives prize knowledge of these anomalies. Additionally, some beings have evolved to fold space within their own bodies, allowing their limbs to function as satellites to their main bodies, operating seemingly independently, or possibly even acting as feeding organs for a being whose essential body remains safe in their lair.

[Segev]

I like the idea of primordial magic randomly occurring in the land. I'm definitely using that.

Looking at all of this (the above aside), I was inspired and came up with a wacky combination of some suggestions.

A layered world where one part consists of a sky, landmasses that float on water, the world-ocean itself, and the ocean bottom that also generates a ton of light on its underside. Thus, another sky/land/water/bottom would be below , and so on, and so on. One of the final tasks given to the party would be to descend into the bottom of this world, probably to restore some balance or fight some fishhead who got there first.

And the pressure (both literal and metaphorical) increases the further down they go?


You may also want to watch an anime called "Made In Abyss" for some inspiration.

[MagneticKitty]

Maybe the world is inside out where the outer layer is a flaming molten exterior and all the inhabitable land and water are inside the crust. "Volcanoes" or sky vents as they call them, let in warmth and sunlight from the surface. Largest cities are in these massive craters with a sky view. With tunnels connecting them. The center of the planet is all ocean where things have adapted to no sunlight. All sea animals have gills and are adjusted to complete darkness, some bioluminess.
Sky creatures may have a settlement on a very low hanging moon that's in atmosphere and rarely come down and are alien to the main planet.

Main struggle would be war for land that's in Sky vents and sources of fresh water springs. Lesser races may have been pushed deeper into the earth like drow, kobold or goblins. These races see those without darkvision as weak. The light needing races may have more mixed genetics from living in such a compact area.

[Horsz]

Some are of the word change drastically with the moment of day they are. Like the rise of tide in the normal world, but more extreme. maybe at morning the nature is florid, and in the afternoon is covered in snow. You can apply that anormality even with magic (at morning it all get power-up with a metamagic of your choice, and in the afternoon it have a bigger chance of miss)

[FoxWyrd]

To piggy-back on the idea of the Sky Whales listed previously, I think that there should be entire cities devoted to whaling (that are in decline with the severely over-farmed whales) full of whalers seeking to hunt them for their precious blood (for magic) and oil (for machinery and other things). Essentially, give it a Steampunk vibe.

[Koo Rehtorb]

Gravity points towards the nearest ground, not towards the center of the planet. So you can do things like walk up the side of a sheer cliff face.

[Segev]

Gravity points towards the nearest ground, not towards the center of the planet. So you can do things like walk up the side of a sheer cliff face.

Be careful with this one. "What counts as 'ground?'" can be an annoying question to have to deal with.

[Deffers]

Yunno what? I'm gonna buck the trends on this thread and I'm going to suggest you look at the artwork of Zdislaw Beksinski (https://www.wikiart.org/en/zdislav-beksinski/all-works#!#filterName:all-paintings-chronologically,resultType:masonry). Pick a random spot or scene or thing from his paintings and make it into your world if you want unsettlingly alien.

Here's just some examples of what I mean.

Want a location? Here you go:

http://t.wallpaperweb.org/wallpaper/darkart/1600x1200/Zdzislaw_Beksinski_67_1600x1200.jpg
Want a quest? How do you open this, and what's inside:

http://www.boszart.pl/91-thickbox_default/zdzislaw-beksiski-obraz.jpg
Want a creature design? Sure:

https://i1.wp.com/ae01.alicdn.com/kf/HTB1B3KMLpXXXXalXXXXq6xXFXXXW/god-of-death-moon-Zdzislaw-Beksinski-Artwork-Home-Decoration-art-work-painting-Print-On-Canvas-unframed.jpg?crop=5,2,900,500&quality=2880
Want an encounter? Try the scenario of this thing pouring out those things:

https://uploads1.wikiart.org/images/zdislav-beksinski/untitled-158.jpg!Large.jpg
Thinking of a way to give reality multiple layers? Here you go:

http://linesandcolors.com/images/2009-02/beksinski_450.jpg

[Wardog]

Speaking of sky whales, here is a particularly weird animation from the 80s about sky whales and the people that hunt them:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQ6qw1nh0tA