Tag Archives: world building

Worldbuilding: Theft, Inspiration, & Homage

Posted on by Henry

Culturally, we put a lot of emphasis and value on originality. An undue emphasis, as far as I can tell. I believe art (and yes, worldbuilding is art) is founded more on sharing and mixing and reinventing than it is on truly novel ideas. I think we should embrace that.

For context: this follows directly from last week’s post on worldbuilding. Last week I mentioned stealing inspiration and using pieces of other stories, but I focused on embracing inconsistency. I should have also referenced my old post about leaving blank spaces. This week we’ll focus on the stealing, sampling, and paying homage side of things.

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World Building: Starting Skills

Posted on by Henry

I was talking with a friend of mine recently about worldbuilding and how to teach the skill, and I realized that I’m not sure where to start.

I think my perspective is warped. I’ve been making up worlds for stories and games for so long, the whole process has become second nature. I haven’t consciously examined the process of worldbuilding in a long time.

Given that I’m planning to run a class for people who want to be DMs (or GMs, or storytellers, or whatever the hell you want to call the person running your roleplaying game), I think I need a clearer approach. I do have some ideas.

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