PhoenixPhyre
2021-03-28, 11:58 PM
I have a "main" world building project (Dawn of Hope (https://wiki.admiralbenbo.org)). But sometimes I have worlds that just spring to life in my head and won't go away until I write them down. And even then they stay around. I don't have any plans for these--not stories or games. Most of them would require (if turned into a game) very different rulesets than I'm used to. I'm sure none of them are particularly unique, but they are insistent.
Here are brief descriptions of a couple of them, the web of worlds multiverse and Koldun.
https://www.admiralbenbo.org/images/misc/web_of_worlds.png
A multiverse ruled by four Paradigms in two dualities: Technology/Magic and Spirit/Matter. These Paradigms influence the physical laws of the universes within their ambit. Not all universes are "stable"--most of them are fleeting fragments (kinda like Amber's shadows). And even the stable ones can disappear (with another taking its place) as the balance of Paradigms within it shifts.
Magic is (at least in this depiction) much more chaotic and individualistic than tech. To the point that the far reaches of the top have no stable laws at all, anarchy at the level of physical law itself. So sort of a weak correlation to Law/Chaos, but without any moral flavoring. It just...is. Spirit is concerned with the immaterial, where thought determines reality (in the extremes), while Matter is where physical laws dominate all.
One thought I had is that none of the extremes are likely to be anything people from earth would understand or be comfortable in.
Four worlds stand on the intersections of pairs; four are well within a "quadrant" dominated by two of the four. And no, the universe isn't a two-dimensional thing, that's just one way of looking at it.
Where Tech and Spirit dominate, you have a world that has become more and more digital, with AI and mind uploading, Singularity. Where Tech and Matter dominate, you have a world with nanomachines, replicators, and body modifications/cyborg implants, Ubiquity.
Where Matter and Magic dominate, you have an elemental world dominated by dragons and monsters of legend, Drakonia. Where Magic and Spirit dominate, you have Faerie (the Fair Folk of legend, who are not necessarily nice) and the laws of nature are...well...flexible.
Tir na nog is a world of elves (of the celtic sidhe-esque variety, not the Tolkien/D&D variety). Bastion a world of magitech. Cyberia is basically a mashup of all the cyberpunk/body-mod/weak-ai genre. Holy Terra is a world ruled by gods/spirits and their priests, as well as psychics, voudun, and paranormal practitioners of all types.
Some people, known as web-walkers, can traverse between worlds. This isn't trivial, and incurs costs.
Dissonance: What web-walkers experience when on worlds other than their home. And for those that don't spend enough time at home, they feel dissonance everywhere--they've become detached and rootless.
Dissonance is the sense of not fitting in. Of things being wrong in fundamental ways. Its root cause is the conflict between the Paradigms and not being aligned with the current world's balance. It surfaces as mental stress and even physiological changes, as the nimbus the walker brought along conflicts with the forces of the world. When a walker has exhausted their reserves of strength, any additional dissonance is enough to create an Ego Break (which can mean anything from a mild sickness to being ejected from that world, often leaving a rift behind, or outright dissolution of your identity, leaving a monstrous Void Born in your place).
The amount of dissonance experienced scales (at base) with the distance the walker is away from their home. And moving between outer worlds and inner worlds is much more costly than moving among inner worlds.
World 1
World 2
"Hops"
Base Dissonance (arbitrary units)
Inner
Inner
1
1
Outer
Inner
1
2
Inner
Inner
2
4
Outer
Inner
2
8
Outer
Outer
2
16
Outer
Outer
3
32
Most normal people, regardless of the world of origin, can handle 1-2 dissonance and no more. 10 is the normal limit for "superpowered" people. Only those of supreme power can start from an outer world and maintain themselves in another outer world, even in an adjacent quadrant, and no one except __________ has ever been recorded to have managed the trip to an opposing quadrant and that effort caused a massive Ego Break once __________ caused Paradox.
Paradox: What local residents experience in the presence of a walker who does something that breaks the normal local laws. Mild amounts can be rationalized away--he wasn't really hit by that car, or he had an adrenaline rush that granted supernal strength for a moment, or… Greater amounts, caused by more flagrant violation, cause varying effects in the people and world around them. Many of these are psychological, causing trauma, nightmares, headaches, sickness, or outright psychosis. At extreme levels, it can cause a local Realignment, changing the local balance of Paradigms. This allows walkers to actually change the world. However, paradox carries risks for the walkers as well, especially if the people are particularly stubborn. For a large enough group of people can unconsciously reject the paradox, causing it to rebound on the walker as a surge of dissonance. This frequently causes the more destructive forms of Ego Break.
So if a dragon (local to Drakonia) shows up in Bastion and takes on their true form, they're going to cause paradox for anyone who sees them. Note that compared to White Wolf's Mage games, this is reversed. Everyone around the wonder-worker experiences paradox when they enact the wonder, while the walker experiences dissonance just by being there. And if you try to do a wonder and fail, especially if that failure is caused by the presence of locals who reject your wonder, Bad Things Happen to you. Death or insanity are the nice forms. Worst case your self shatters and a Void Born (monster, basically) is created.
Death and horror are very possible here. None of the forces involved are playing around, and you don't bounce back. Web-walkers have short lifespans unless they're very careful. And even then, rates of insanity and other trauma are way higher than normal.
This one is much less fleshed out. Basically, a world where magic is both quasi-alive and changes things that are affected/use it. Basically chaotic, not orderly at all. Everything's happily in dynamic balance between the types of magic and the world is basically uninhabited by fleshly intelligences--only the bodiless beings of pure energy known as djinn (or demons, or a bunch of other names I haven't figured out) have intelligence.
Then a high-tech colony ship crashes through the barriers between universes on accident and makes a forced landing. These humans use technology (which, as something of Order and consistent laws, is not all that compatible with magic) to create barriers around their crash site. These barriers (in the form of gigantic monoliths spaced some distance apart) act as breakwaters, making magic in the area "tame" and in fact basically passive. As they try to expand, creating a second set of barriers, the world (and those who have been exposed and changed by the wild magic) strike back and prevent full deployment, leading to somewhat of a stalemate.
So you'd have a core of "true humans" clustered around the crash site, those not touched by magic. They'd have high tech, but be unwilling to venture out, lest they become "contaminated". Then you'd have people living in the middle zones, where magic is around but isn't dominant. They'd be mages and more "humanoid" changed beings. On the outside of the barriers you'd have the wild magic and those who have fully been "lost" to it. Different balances of elemental forces would result in different creatures.
As I said, I don't have any plans for these worlds. And none of them are fleshed out very far at all. They're just...there. Stuck in my brain. And now sloshed out to yours.
Here are brief descriptions of a couple of them, the web of worlds multiverse and Koldun.
https://www.admiralbenbo.org/images/misc/web_of_worlds.png
A multiverse ruled by four Paradigms in two dualities: Technology/Magic and Spirit/Matter. These Paradigms influence the physical laws of the universes within their ambit. Not all universes are "stable"--most of them are fleeting fragments (kinda like Amber's shadows). And even the stable ones can disappear (with another taking its place) as the balance of Paradigms within it shifts.
Magic is (at least in this depiction) much more chaotic and individualistic than tech. To the point that the far reaches of the top have no stable laws at all, anarchy at the level of physical law itself. So sort of a weak correlation to Law/Chaos, but without any moral flavoring. It just...is. Spirit is concerned with the immaterial, where thought determines reality (in the extremes), while Matter is where physical laws dominate all.
One thought I had is that none of the extremes are likely to be anything people from earth would understand or be comfortable in.
Four worlds stand on the intersections of pairs; four are well within a "quadrant" dominated by two of the four. And no, the universe isn't a two-dimensional thing, that's just one way of looking at it.
Where Tech and Spirit dominate, you have a world that has become more and more digital, with AI and mind uploading, Singularity. Where Tech and Matter dominate, you have a world with nanomachines, replicators, and body modifications/cyborg implants, Ubiquity.
Where Matter and Magic dominate, you have an elemental world dominated by dragons and monsters of legend, Drakonia. Where Magic and Spirit dominate, you have Faerie (the Fair Folk of legend, who are not necessarily nice) and the laws of nature are...well...flexible.
Tir na nog is a world of elves (of the celtic sidhe-esque variety, not the Tolkien/D&D variety). Bastion a world of magitech. Cyberia is basically a mashup of all the cyberpunk/body-mod/weak-ai genre. Holy Terra is a world ruled by gods/spirits and their priests, as well as psychics, voudun, and paranormal practitioners of all types.
Some people, known as web-walkers, can traverse between worlds. This isn't trivial, and incurs costs.
Dissonance: What web-walkers experience when on worlds other than their home. And for those that don't spend enough time at home, they feel dissonance everywhere--they've become detached and rootless.
Dissonance is the sense of not fitting in. Of things being wrong in fundamental ways. Its root cause is the conflict between the Paradigms and not being aligned with the current world's balance. It surfaces as mental stress and even physiological changes, as the nimbus the walker brought along conflicts with the forces of the world. When a walker has exhausted their reserves of strength, any additional dissonance is enough to create an Ego Break (which can mean anything from a mild sickness to being ejected from that world, often leaving a rift behind, or outright dissolution of your identity, leaving a monstrous Void Born in your place).
The amount of dissonance experienced scales (at base) with the distance the walker is away from their home. And moving between outer worlds and inner worlds is much more costly than moving among inner worlds.
World 1
World 2
"Hops"
Base Dissonance (arbitrary units)
Inner
Inner
1
1
Outer
Inner
1
2
Inner
Inner
2
4
Outer
Inner
2
8
Outer
Outer
2
16
Outer
Outer
3
32
Most normal people, regardless of the world of origin, can handle 1-2 dissonance and no more. 10 is the normal limit for "superpowered" people. Only those of supreme power can start from an outer world and maintain themselves in another outer world, even in an adjacent quadrant, and no one except __________ has ever been recorded to have managed the trip to an opposing quadrant and that effort caused a massive Ego Break once __________ caused Paradox.
Paradox: What local residents experience in the presence of a walker who does something that breaks the normal local laws. Mild amounts can be rationalized away--he wasn't really hit by that car, or he had an adrenaline rush that granted supernal strength for a moment, or… Greater amounts, caused by more flagrant violation, cause varying effects in the people and world around them. Many of these are psychological, causing trauma, nightmares, headaches, sickness, or outright psychosis. At extreme levels, it can cause a local Realignment, changing the local balance of Paradigms. This allows walkers to actually change the world. However, paradox carries risks for the walkers as well, especially if the people are particularly stubborn. For a large enough group of people can unconsciously reject the paradox, causing it to rebound on the walker as a surge of dissonance. This frequently causes the more destructive forms of Ego Break.
So if a dragon (local to Drakonia) shows up in Bastion and takes on their true form, they're going to cause paradox for anyone who sees them. Note that compared to White Wolf's Mage games, this is reversed. Everyone around the wonder-worker experiences paradox when they enact the wonder, while the walker experiences dissonance just by being there. And if you try to do a wonder and fail, especially if that failure is caused by the presence of locals who reject your wonder, Bad Things Happen to you. Death or insanity are the nice forms. Worst case your self shatters and a Void Born (monster, basically) is created.
Death and horror are very possible here. None of the forces involved are playing around, and you don't bounce back. Web-walkers have short lifespans unless they're very careful. And even then, rates of insanity and other trauma are way higher than normal.
This one is much less fleshed out. Basically, a world where magic is both quasi-alive and changes things that are affected/use it. Basically chaotic, not orderly at all. Everything's happily in dynamic balance between the types of magic and the world is basically uninhabited by fleshly intelligences--only the bodiless beings of pure energy known as djinn (or demons, or a bunch of other names I haven't figured out) have intelligence.
Then a high-tech colony ship crashes through the barriers between universes on accident and makes a forced landing. These humans use technology (which, as something of Order and consistent laws, is not all that compatible with magic) to create barriers around their crash site. These barriers (in the form of gigantic monoliths spaced some distance apart) act as breakwaters, making magic in the area "tame" and in fact basically passive. As they try to expand, creating a second set of barriers, the world (and those who have been exposed and changed by the wild magic) strike back and prevent full deployment, leading to somewhat of a stalemate.
So you'd have a core of "true humans" clustered around the crash site, those not touched by magic. They'd have high tech, but be unwilling to venture out, lest they become "contaminated". Then you'd have people living in the middle zones, where magic is around but isn't dominant. They'd be mages and more "humanoid" changed beings. On the outside of the barriers you'd have the wild magic and those who have fully been "lost" to it. Different balances of elemental forces would result in different creatures.
As I said, I don't have any plans for these worlds. And none of them are fleshed out very far at all. They're just...there. Stuck in my brain. And now sloshed out to yours.