Creation Daily

[Coinshooter he/him]

There are so many good ideas here... good job to all of you!

 

Recently, I've been breaking my head over a series called Isonys LORE (LORE being an acronym that formed itself rather fortuitously). I've been trying to figure out how the Universe forms and maintains itself spiritually. It's really hard, but recently, I've been working more on powers that stretch from the four bases of the Universe - there are three for each, one creative, one sensory/communicative, and one modifying. I have 9 of the twelve powers - and I'm trying to make these a lot harder (per Sanderson's First Law), and that's been going very well.

 

What I'm trying to solidify more than anything at the moment is something I call Planar Theory. Most things are comprised of three planes ( a Low, Mid, and Highplane), which each govern the next plane in line (Low to Mid, Mid to High, High to Low). The Lowplane contains the base template/idea for the object, which sends information to the Midplane. The Midplane, using undetermined processes, gathers the materials (called Intraplanes) for the object and synthesizes them together (blueprints/detailed plans), which then causes that to synthesize on the Highplane. Actions on the Highplane can affect and change the template/idea on the Lowplane, which then starts the cycle over. Also, objects can only communicate on the Highplane, unless certain circumstances are met (and now I can do my own RAFO'ing here  ).

[mail-mi he/him]

I just got the best idea for the restructured plot of the fourth book of my series. Broken down into bullet points (because I like bullet points ) it's like this: 

 

• During a competitive and important basketball game, Spencer collapses because of a migraine and blacks out. While blacked out, he sees one of his opponents make a winning shot. When he wakes up, that opponent lines up for that exact shot, and he manages to block it for the win, thus discovering his future-seeing powers. 
• JJ survives a plane crash, and Spencer's family takes him in for the night. 
• Spencer receives a golden pocket watch, and sees a vision of the future where he and JJ press the small button on the side of it. 
• They do so, and get sent to the future where 1) 10-30 years ago an asteroid impacted china in the middle of the night, and it was so big that it actually caused the earth to move closer to the sun, and completely covered earth in tons of dust, and killed most people in Asia, 2) because of this, the area between the Tropics is unsurvivable because of the heat, (making travel between the hemispheres impossible) and the polar ice caps are completely gone, and it only snows in one place in Alaska where the weather and wind patterns create an area almost completely free of dust, and where snow can fall, 3) also because of this, people in America live underground. They managed to survive the cataclysm because of advancements in technology, allowing them to live underground and grow food with solar lighting, and transfer between underground cities using Particle Transmitters, or PTs, and 4) before the asteroid, Europe a) united, b ) put AIs in higher governmental positions, which eventually lead to c) them electing an AI as president. Immediately after that the asteroid hit, and as they started to recover the AI decided that "protecting Europe" (one of its prime directives) meant to destroy everything that wasn't Europe. The asteroid did most of that work, all the AI has to do is destroy America, so it started feeding the citizens of the EU propoganda that made them hate America and all it stood for.
• They meet Marissa, who works for H. C. Krash, who is developing a concoction that can make humans immune to radiation. Why is that necessary? Because of the constant threat of Europe suddenly deciding to nuke America. It needs three ingredients: Snow (found only in Alaska), Urca Venom, (a type of mutant snake that is the only think that can and has to live in the Shift [the unlivable place between the tropics]), and Ploo-um Juice (a genetically modified fruit found only in, you guessed it, Europe).

I'll tell more about this later, this is taking forever to type up.  

[Mailliw73 he/him]

For the current story I have in mind and am beginning to write, I am thinking of trying out a different structure than typically. First off, you need to know that the main character, Kahad, was a vigilante type hero who now is giving up on hope and trying to go back to a normal life. That's the "Present" timeline. What I want to do is have three different timelines going throughout the story: One, the Present, where Kahad is dealing with dejection and trying to establish a regular life. Two, the Far Past, about Kahad as a young man, growing up and learning and training. This will end with him becoming a vigilante. Three, the Recent Past, the stories of Kahad as a vigilante up until he decides to give up. 

 

I want to interweave these three timelines of Kahad's life together, like Brandon did in Elantris with the three viewpoints, so that we learn about Kahad's entire life in three different times. The Far Past thread of story will end where the Recent Past thread began and the Recent Past will end where the Present began. Does this make sense? If not, say something and I'll try to explain it better.

 

So the question I have is: Is this too weird or does it sound interesting?

Edited July 15, 2015 by Mailliw73

[ccstat he/him]

Mailliw, That sounds interesting but difficult to pull off. There are a lot of stories that have successfully done something similar with two timelines, especially historical mysteries, but three is tough. I think you will run into two foreseeable problems that will need to be planned for.

First, there needs to be at least one (preferably more) really good reveal for each of the past timelines. A betrayal, an injury, an unexpected success, but importantly one that cannot be surmised from what has been revealed from the other timelines already. If the reader knows what to expect already, it is much harder to make them interested in the flashbacks/flashforwards. (Still doable, but takes serious skill.)

Second, in the story you've outlined the present timeline is the one with the least action. That runs the risk of the readers becoming bored with the present day character and events. Brandon has said of Elantris that most readers like two of the plotlines and not the third, because it gets in the way of finding out what happens in the ones the do like. The opinions seem pretty evenly split between Sarene, Raoden, and Hrathen, so it's more a function of the format than the story itself. I've seen this happen with other multi-POV books, most recently The Broken Eye by Brent Weeks. Fans disagree about which plot line was boring and in the way, but many think that one of them was. The added danger for you is that the present day story is the one that should have the biggest emotional payoff and reader investment, since that is where the character actually ends up, but it is also the most internal. Obviously this can be done well, such as in the frame story for Rothfuas' Kingkiller books, but the depressed has-been is harder to make exciting than their earlier action-oriented versions.

Good luck!

[Kobold King he/him]

Currently envisioning a retrocog in the distant future, who's gone mad with her visions of the past and has become something of an insane prophetess leading a violent crusade across the galaxy.

 

She has a robot arm that she's come to believe possesses the reincarnated soul of Genghis Khan, and she addresses it accordingly. It's not her robotic arm, mind you--she has both her original limbs intact. It's a prosthetic arm she tore off the body of a mercenary she killed, and she waves it around and talks to it like Woody with Buzz's arm in Toy Story.

 

 

I'm not sure how to work this into my current setting, but I know that I very much want to.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

Currently envisioning a retrocog in the distant future, who's gone mad with her visions of the past and has become something of an insane prophetess leading a violent crusade across the galaxy.

She has a robot arm that she's come to believe possesses the reincarnated soul of Genghis Khan, and she addresses it accordingly. It's not her robotic arm, mind you--she has both her original limbs intact. It's a prosthetic arm she tore off the body of a mercenary she killed, and she waves it around and talks to it like Woody with Buzz's arm in Toy Story.

I'm not sure how to work this into my current setting, but I know that I very much want to.

Don't "work it in." That is not a character who should be "worked in." Plot a story around that lady and go to town.

[Kobold King he/him]

Don't "work it in." That is not a character who should be "worked in." Plot a story around that lady and go to town.

 

Currently considering her as a fourteen year-old human girl who grew up on a Russian colony world. I'm pretty pleased with the name I picked out for her:

 

Ilyena Vchera.

 

"Vchera" being the Russian word for "yesterday," hinting at her powers. I always admired the J.K. Rowling method of naming characters.

[+Slowswift he/him]

Currently considering her as a fourteen year-old human girl who grew up on a Russian colony world. I'm pretty pleased with the name I picked out for her:

 

Ilyena Vchera.

 

"Vchera" being the Russian word for "yesterday," hinting at her powers. I always admired the J.K. Rowling method of naming characters.

 

Me too. Naming and creating characters is one of my favorite parts of worldbuilding.

[Coinshooter he/him]

Me too. Naming and creating characters is one of my favorite parts of worldbuilding.

Indeed. I've noticed in my personal experience that in stories where I have the world pretty well defined, but the characters are just names being bent to the will of the plot, I usually end up trashing it before even getting around to writing anything. Or, in less words: good characters are, in my opinion, the best foundation for worldbuilding. Which is why I'm focusing on character bios right now instead of pretty much anything else.

[Kobold King he/him]

So one of the alien races in my setting communicates in an entirely visual language. They're basically like cuttlefish-velociraptors, and they talk by flashing their skin colors in complex patterns at each other. I think it's a pretty neat way to set them apart from humans, personally.

 

My one issue for a while now has been the struggle with naming conventions. When aliens with vocal languages name a planet, it's been easy for me to simply make up a gibberish word that sounds right for the setting. I can then state that this gibberish word is just a part of their language, or it's the name of some mythological hero, or whatever.

 

Not so with the cuttlefish-velociraptors. Because their language is based on color, I can't just make up gibberish words for their names. For a while, this gave me a lot of trouble.

 

I was still struggling with it until about yesterday, when I finally realized that this wasn't a problem--it was an opportunity.

 

All I need to do is make sure their names for themselves and their planets are simple words. For instance, there's a lush green world in their domain with abundant physical resources they've fought over, and this world is called Temptation.

 

I can name every planet in their part of space with a cool one-word name.

 

Temptation.

 

Verdant.

 

Idyll.

 

Depth and Delusion.

 

 

Maybe those don't sound very cool to anyone else, but I'm pretty happy with the way things are coming together for me.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

So one of the alien races in my setting communicates in an entirely visual language. They're basically like cuttlefish-velociraptors, and they talk by flashing their skin colors in complex patterns at each other. I think it's a pretty neat way to set them apart from humans, personally.

 

My one issue for a while now has been the struggle with naming conventions. When aliens with vocal languages name a planet, it's been easy for me to simply make up a gibberish word that sounds right for the setting. I can then state that this gibberish word is just a part of their language, or it's the name of some mythological hero, or whatever.

 

Not so with the cuttlefish-velociraptors. Because their language is based on color, I can't just make up gibberish words for their names. For a while, this gave me a lot of trouble.

 

I was still struggling with it until about yesterday, when I finally realized that this wasn't a problem--it was an opportunity.

 

All I need to do is make sure their names for themselves and their planets are simple words. For instance, there's a lush green world in their domain with abundant physical resources they've fought over, and this world is called Temptation.

 

I can name every planet in their part of space with a cool one-word name.

 

Temptation.

 

Verdant.

 

Idyll.

 

Depth and Delusion.

 

 

Maybe those don't sound very cool to anyone else, but I'm pretty happy with the way things are coming together for me.

 

I want to see a Star Trek spinoff series with these guys. Not a one-off episode where the human captain makes peace with this race or something—no, I want a full-on series about these aliens. I want one of them to be the captain of their own starship, and I want the majority of the crew members to be of this race, and I want at least three seasons. 

 

And I want it now.  

[Coinshooter he/him]

So one of the alien races in my setting communicates in an entirely visual language. They're basically like cuttlefish-velociraptors, and they talk by flashing their skin colors in complex patterns at each other. I think it's a pretty neat way to set them apart from humans, personally.

 

My one issue for a while now has been the struggle with naming conventions. When aliens with vocal languages name a planet, it's been easy for me to simply make up a gibberish word that sounds right for the setting. I can then state that this gibberish word is just a part of their language, or it's the name of some mythological hero, or whatever.

 

Not so with the cuttlefish-velociraptors. Because their language is based on color, I can't just make up gibberish words for their names. For a while, this gave me a lot of trouble.

 

I was still struggling with it until about yesterday, when I finally realized that this wasn't a problem--it was an opportunity.

 

All I need to do is make sure their names for themselves and their planets are simple words. For instance, there's a lush green world in their domain with abundant physical resources they've fought over, and this world is called Temptation.

 

I can name every planet in their part of space with a cool one-word name.

 

Temptation.

 

Verdant.

 

Idyll.

 

Depth and Delusion.

 

 

Maybe those don't sound very cool to anyone else, but I'm pretty happy with the way things are coming together for me.

Now I'm wishing I'd come up with something like that. Usually it's something like telepathy when it comes to these kinds of things. But what I want to know is similar to TwiLyght - how does this race react to and communicate with the other races?

 

Also cuttlefish velociraptors. You just get all the points today.

[ccstat he/him]

If you are interested in looking at ways that other authors have handled the color language idea, Arthur C. Clark included a race that communicated that way in his Rendezvous with Rama series. IIRC they show up in the second book and play a prominent role in the third.

My recollection is that the translation was fairly straightforward, after recognizing that our vision doesn't directly overlap with the spectrum they see. There was, I think, little if any exploration of the quirks of the language, except that the individual who interacted with the humans most had a "speech impediment" such that all of his words bleed over into blue. (When the humans found out, they felt bad about calling him "Dr. Blue" all along.)

Edited July 26, 2015 by ccstat

[Gabriele she/her]

Cuttlefish-velociraptors totally deserve an upvote.

Edited July 26, 2015 by Gabriele

[Kobold King he/him]

Now I'm wishing I'd come up with something like that. Usually it's something like telepathy when it comes to these kinds of things. But what I want to know is similar to TwiLyght - how does this race react to and communicate with the other races?

 

Also cuttlefish velociraptors. You just get all the points today.

 

 

They're still a work in progress, but I'm glad you all find the concept so fascinating.

 

These creatures--I've cycled through a lot of different names for them, but right now they're the Supernalians--do have trouble communicating with a lot of the galaxy's other races. Not because of their language itself, for which translating software exists and is readily available, but because of the way they use their language.

 

You see, the Supernalians evolved from fierce pack predators on their homeworld. Their visual communication developed as an instantaneous way for them to communicate with other pack members during hunts, allowing for the pack to unify and function as one. Their language thus became a sort of visual telepathy, as all of their thoughts and emotions are pasted in their skin for all their pack to read.

 

While modern Supernalians have a little more conscious control over their language, the concept of deliberately hiding one's thoughts or feelings is still repulsive to them. Like human children, they tend to speak their minds on reflex, with little thought to the consequences of their words.

 

So while English and Supernalian can be easily translated back and forth, Supernalians tend to miss nuance in our words and humans can be discomforted by the Supernalian proclivity for telling us exactly how revolting they find us, or contrariwise, exactly how appetizing they find portly humans. This causes more than a few communication difficulties, as you can imagine.

 

 

If you are interested in looking at ways that other authors have handled the color language idea, Arthur C. Clark included a race that communicated that way in his Rendezvous with Rama series. IIRC they show up in the second book and play a prominent role in the third.

My recollection is that the translation was fairly straightforward, after recognizing that our vision doesn't directly overlap with the spectrum they see. There was, I think, little if any exploration of the quirks of the language, except that the individual who interacted with the humans most had a "speech impediment" such that all of his words bleed over into blue. (When the humans found out, they felt bad about calling him "Dr. Blue" all along.)

 

Thanks for the recommendation! I've loved Arthur C. Clarke in the past, so I'll have to check out Rendezvous with Rama sometime.

 

 

I want to see a Star Trek spinoff series with these guys. Not a one-off episode where the human captain makes peace with this race or something—no, I want a full-on series about these aliens. I want one of them to be the captain of their own starship, and I want the majority of the crew members to be of this race, and I want at least three seasons. 

 

And I want it now.

Cuttlefish-velociraptors totally deserve an upvote.

 

 

Awww, you guys. I definitely want to write at least a test story featuring one of their PoVs soon, just to help me flesh out their race more. Shall I post it when I do?

[+Slowswift he/him]

...

Thanks for the recommendation! I've loved Arthur C. Clarke in the past, so I'll have to check out Rendezvous with Rama sometime.

...

Awww, you guys. I definitely want to write at least a test story featuring one of their PoVs soon, just to help me flesh out their race more. Shall I post it when I do?

 

I have never actually read Clarke. Should I?

 

And yes. Yes you should. 

[Kobold King he/him]

I have never actually read Clarke. Should I?

 

I've read Childhood's End and 2001: A Space Odyssey. I found the philosophy behind Childhood's End a bit disturbing personally, but it was an amazing book and I'd definitely recommend it to you.

 

 

 

 

Now, in this week's episode of Wacky Kid Kobold...

 

Looking through my old composition books, I realize just how disturbing some of my worldbuilding concepts really were. There's a race of peaceful lobsters that were enslaved and corrupted by a sapient magical moss that took over their bodies and poisoned their minds. There's a race of reptilian centaurs that are raised in vats, battled against each other for their entire hatchling existence, and are then dropped onto enemy planets as fiercely conditioned shock troops. And most disturbingly, there's a race of bats that can only use magic by causing themselves physical pain, and have invented special arm cuffs that cause them to feel agony without harming their bodies.

 

...

 

I wasn't a juvenile psychopath, I swear.

Edited July 30, 2015 by Kobold King

[ccstat he/him]

I have never actually read Clarke. Should I?

Probably? Together with his contemporaries Asimov and Heinlein, he made the foundation for much of what science fiction has become. Some of his books are definitely classics.

That being said, sometimes the classics disappoint if you are familiar with what has happened since then. One of my sisters-in-law only read Tolkien after she had read a ton of other fantasy books. By the time she got to LotR, it felt derivative and boring to her--so many works were influenced by it, and new developments in the genre had led to faster pacing and different voice conventions. It has been a long time since I read Clarke, so I don't remember it well enough to confidently recommend his writing in comparison to what else you may have read in SF.I remember enjoying it at the time, though.

Edited July 30, 2015 by ccstat

[Coinshooter he/him]

Here are some ideas I've had recently. Not necessarily plot ideas, but something I'd like to share either way.

 

The first is this: an open-source world, where everything is available to use, and the only rules are 1) no changing the established canon/rules, and 2) all works are canon, even the contradictory ones, thanks to some canonical event that caused multiverses to appear. It's a rough idea, and I don't think I'd ever see it to fruition - unless somebody worked with me on it. It's a project whose development goes as far as that, so it's waaaaaaaay on the backburner.

 

Another idea, which I just had today, has more to do with personal worldbuilding. Being a writer of comics and a poor artist of humans, I figure that it would be good to do these two things in conjunction with each other on a daily basis. 1) I design a character, either for a story I already have in development, and once I do, I 2) develop that character with a backstory and personality. Two quick little things that can help me grow in skill in more than one aspect and give me content that I can save for later.

[Mailliw73 he/him]

I've had three beginnings to stories over the past year and I've never finished them. Today I realized that all three can be in the same world, if not the same story.

[Kobold King he/him]

Here are some ideas I've had recently. Not necessarily plot ideas, but something I'd like to share either way.

 

The first is this: an open-source world, where everything is available to use, and the only rules are 1) no changing the established canon/rules, and 2) all works are canon, even the contradictory ones, thanks to some canonical event that caused multiverses to appear. It's a rough idea, and I don't think I'd ever see it to fruition - unless somebody worked with me on it. It's a project whose development goes as far as that, so it's waaaaaaaay on the backburner.

 

 

Color me intrigued. Any idea on what themes or concepts this setting would explore, or have you not figured that out yet?

[Quiver he/him]

I had an idea lately. I shared it with Delightful on PMs, but I wanted to shoot it past the open forum as well; partly because I am a person who is always desperate for validation, and partly because I need a little bit of help with the ecosystem.

 

So, a while ago, I mentioned the idea of Unicorn Knights. So... I was doing  alittle bit of research to try and create a world around it, and it turns out that Greek Natural History held that Unicorns roamed wild in India. I've been thinking for a while that it might be fun to try a setting which uses Celtic/Hindu as a base to start developing from, rather than Europe, so that fit together; a fantasy world which is Celtic/Indian, with a dash of Ancient Greece.

 

So, when I was doing some research on Unicorns, I found out that there is an animal in the Hebrew Bible, the Re'em, which some people mistranslated as "Unicorn". It actually was an auroch-like creature. A friend of mine also mentioned that he's always loved the idea of someone riding a Great Irish Elk (like Thranduil does in the Hobbit movies) because... well, their antler's are huge.

 

So... I kinda had this idea for the society.

 

Basically, that, a "motiff" of the animals of it is that they have horns/antlers; and, if you've seen the size of an Irish Elk's antlers you might understand the following train of thought; basically, people in this world believe that the God/God's (still haven't figured this part out) that made these animals gave them these antlers/horns as "crowns". Because it is usually the male's of a species which have antlers, they interpret this to mean that men are "above" and superior to women.

Unicorn's are on the biggest exceptions since

-a) they have huge horns (classical greek History describes them as 27 inches long)  

- Male and Female Unicorns have them

-c) Men cannot tame or ride unicorns. At all. I'm stealing the old myths about how Unicorn's could only be tamed by innocent women, but... yeah, only women can be Unicorn Knights.

 

My idea was that... in recent years, this dynamic has changed somewhat, to a more egalitarian society (possibly by the discovery of horned female creatures, possibly just as a consequence of social growth). While there are still traditionalists who believe and advocate the above philosophy, they are becoming less influential - think, I suppose, the way that nowadays most people wouldn't support racism, ut that there are still some extremists who do.

 

So... the reason I'm posting here. First, I want to know if you guy's think that the above is too contrived an explanation for how things develop, or if it's one that makes sense. Does the idea of a society in the midst of social transition sound like an interesting setting? And...

Does anyone have any advice on how to create/find animals that would fit the setting? I figure I can borrow some from the natural world, though it might be a bit of a stretch to have them all in the same environment, so I figure I'll have to create some original beasts eventually... 

[Curious Anamaximder he/him]

Sounds great Quiver!

[Kobold King he/him]

I had an idea lately. I shared it with Delightful on PMs, but I wanted to shoot it past the open forum as well; partly because I am a person who is always desperate for validation, and partly because I need a little bit of help with the ecosystem.

 

So, a while ago, I mentioned the idea of Unicorn Knights. So... I was doing  alittle bit of research to try and create a world around it, and it turns out that Greek Natural History held that Unicorns roamed wild in India. I've been thinking for a while that it might be fun to try a setting which uses Celtic/Hindu as a base to start developing from, rather than Europe, so that fit together; a fantasy world which is Celtic/Indian, with a dash of Ancient Greece.

 

So, when I was doing some research on Unicorns, I found out that there is an animal in the Hebrew Bible, the Re'em, which some people mistranslated as "Unicorn". It actually was an auroch-like creature. A friend of mine also mentioned that he's always loved the idea of someone riding a Great Irish Elk (like Thranduil does in the Hobbit movies) because... well, their antler's are huge.

 

So... I kinda had this idea for the society.

 

Basically, that, a "motiff" of the animals of it is that they have horns/antlers; and, if you've seen the size of an Irish Elk's antlers you might understand the following train of thought; basically, people in this world believe that the God/God's (still haven't figured this part out) that made these animals gave them these antlers/horns as "crowns". Because it is usually the male's of a species which have antlers, they interpret this to mean that men are "above" and superior to women.

Unicorn's are on the biggest exceptions since

-a) they have huge horns (classical greek History describes them as 27 inches long)  

- Male and Female Unicorns have them

-c) Men cannot tame or ride unicorns. At all. I'm stealing the old myths about how Unicorn's could only be tamed by innocent women, but... yeah, only women can be Unicorn Knights.

 

My idea was that... in recent years, this dynamic has changed somewhat, to a more egalitarian society (possibly by the discovery of horned female creatures, possibly just as a consequence of social growth). While there are still traditionalists who believe and advocate the above philosophy, they are becoming less influential - think, I suppose, the way that nowadays most people wouldn't support racism, ut that there are still some extremists who do.

 

So... the reason I'm posting here. First, I want to know if you guy's think that the above is too contrived an explanation for how things develop, or if it's one that makes sense. Does the idea of a society in the midst of social transition sound like an interesting setting? And...

Does anyone have any advice on how to create/find animals that would fit the setting? I figure I can borrow some from the natural world, though it might be a bit of a stretch to have them all in the same environment, so I figure I'll have to create some original beasts eventually... 

 

 

I like the idea of this! I'm not an expert on sociology, but it all looks cool to me. 

 

 

But then, you asked about filling the ecosystem, which is kind of my thing...

 

Considering the Irish Elk has served as inspiration for you, have you considered filling the setting with other Ice Age - esque creatures? Huge mammoth-like beasts with tusks like Deinotherium, perhaps.

 

 

Or take the giant Ice Age beaver, seen here on the far right:

 

 

Or fill the setting with glyptodonts, like the big dome-shelled one you see in the picture above. Ice Age animals were very much like our own, but subtly, exotically different in a way that lends perfectly to a fantastic setting.

 

Heck, even unicorns themselves may have been inspired by an extinct rhino originally... ever heard of Elasmotherium?

 

[Mistrunner]

I need a name for a country.

 

The religion is based on the skies, and rainbows are considered to be messages/gifts from heaven, so colors feature very prominently. If your name isn't a color, it's considered heretical. So the country would have to be in some way a color name, but it couldn't just be one color, because each color has its own attributes and stuff.

 

Anyone have any ideas? I'm terrible with names.