World Geography

[Rurik]

Originally Posted by frogspawner

I like the odd bit of wacky geography, but I'm worried it might put some potential authors off. Do people think it would be too silly, or can they live with these sort of ideas?

Well there are some pretty far out ideas, and we may not ever end up using them, but let's not stop them from coming! If we need to scrap them or tone them back that is fine - If they don't make this world they may well make another one. I am not afraid of the the fantastic in my fantasy.

Originally Posted by Atgxtg

I suppose it depends on how silly and what the game world justification is. I wouldn't like it to be silly in game.

I think it is in the presentation. I originally envisioned a gritty world, and it can still be presented that way even with some pretty fantastic elements. The reasonings would be mythological, as clearly some of the ideas presented preclude any possible scientific presentation (though a stationary sun on a flat world surrounded by an 'endless' oceans could easily be part of a ringworld).

[Rurik]

Originally Posted by soltakss

Also, I wouldn't make the land masses too big. Genertela is smaller than the continental USA and has too many cultures to roleplay meaningfully in any one game. Look at the ancient cultures of Eurasia - there are too many to write up and use in a campaign. I'd keep things simple and focussed.

True, but Glorantha has long suffered from scale problems tied to it's board game hex map roots. Grazelanders as nomads in the area of a (not so big) county, the Great Lunar Empire spanning, well, maybe the Mississipi valley.

I'm of the school to say "It is just a game, who cares if there are some scale problems as long as it is fun to play".

I like the approach of coming up with the core cultures, figuring out roughly how they fit, and coming up with a map that accomodates those needs, leaving some open spaces for future development.

[Trifletraxor]

What about the world being an enormous habitat on a huge grown living ship, slowly propelling through space? The Ancients from the city used the habitat to collect various species of lower development which possessed magic, something the ancients didn't, so they could study those species closer and understand the scientific explanation behind it. Going out through the gates to collect their speciments - until they met the demons, and finally got wiped out by the "primitive" inhabitants of their zoo.

The heat source for the habitat is placed in the middle, leading to a dessert in the middle and frozen areas in the periphery. The change between night and day could be instant or gradual. During the night, stars move across the sky, all in the same direction. The world is flat, and the end of the world is a definite end - it can be felt, if you ever reach that far. The living ship could easily be the size of a small planet, eating mass from the planets it visits and collect speciments.

The setting would be fantasy, as all the playable inhabitants would be of cultures with low technological knowledge, but all cultures would have their own type of magic. The ancients sleep (mostly) in cryogenic caskets in their protected towers.

Going overboard?

SGL.

[Trifletraxor]

Maybe also the ancients where only servants of the ship itself? Maybe the ship is the ultimate A.I.? Having conquered all the natural sciences, it's now researching magic and the concept of soul. Searching for it's own?

SGL.

EDIT: The players wouldn't know anything about being on a ship of course, they would only know that their world was flat, hot in the middle, cold near the edges, a sun in the middle, passing stars at night. And that the ancients possessed great magical artifact.

[Rurik]

Well no idea is too far out for this thread so far.

Actually, I had another stationary sun/moon idea where the sun fades at night and actually becomes the moon, and at dawn brightens back into the sun. It could be quite possible to get the moon and walk on it and have adventures at night time, but it would be highly advisable to get off of it by dawn.

I am not adverse to a sci-fi tint to the world (I indeed hinted at the possibility that the founders of Portal were not of the world in my Portal pitch - and in all honesty I had never decided if they came from the same world or not) - but I think presenting the world as straight fantasy will give it more appeal up front. I think Jorune suffered from the Sci-Fi/Fantasy background, it was a bit too odd for many to get a grasp on (on the other hand it is still a beloved setting long after being out of print).

I will go with whatever the group decides, and can easily work with any of the ideas thrown out so far - they are all great and I hope for many more. I feel it may be better to put a Fantasy face forward, rather than a mixed one. None of which to say none of these backgrounds can't be true, and even explored in adventures as the game develops.

[frogspawner]

Originally Posted by Trifletraxor

What about the world being an enormous habitat on a huge grown living ship, slowly propelling through space? ... The players wouldn't know anything about being on a ship of course...

Mmmm - a bit close to Metamorphosis Alpha... and if the inhabitants don't know, do we need to define it? Anyway, I'd thought of it more as a giant snowglobe on the mantelpiece in the gods' living room... one advantage of which is no SciFi battle-cruisers can turn up and start taking pot-shots! But these could be just two of various theories the inhabitants have.

Originally Posted by Rurik

Actually, I had another stationary sun/moon idea where the sun fades at night and actually becomes the moon, and at dawn brightens back into the sun. It could be quite possible to get the moon and walk on it and have adventures at night time, but it would be highly advisable to get off of it by dawn.

That's great. But - walking on the moon? That's absurd: you'd fall off!
However, since the Moon-Sun is stationary, what causes the tides - something lurking down there...? (dun-dun-duuhnnn!) Something vast, breathing under the Central Sea (what with the world being an oval bowl shape), near the centre where it boils daily in the afternoon Sun...

[Rurik]

Originally Posted by frogspawner

That's great. But - walking on the moon? That's absurd: you'd fall off!

Well, yeah, if you try to walk on the bottom of it - duh! You've got stay on the top - it's not like we're suspending reality here.

Originally Posted by frogspawner

However, since the Moon-Sun is stationary, what causes the tides - something lurking down there...? (dun-dun-duuhnnn!) Something vast, breathing under the Central Sea (what with the world being an oval bowl shape), near the centre where it boils daily in the afternoon Sun...

Well, perhaps the sun is directly over the water, and the ocean below it boils during the day, casusing it to expand and the tidal surge to radiate outwards, and at night it cools, and the tides recede back towards the spot below the sun.

Or maybe it just has to do with some gods battling at the bottom of the sea or something. All good ideas.

Or it could be that the world is a sphere, and the moon is in orbit around it, and the gravitational pull of the moon affects the tides or something over the top like that - or perhaps that is too far out.

[Sven Norén]

Do we need tides at all? It's not like they are of much use, except perhaps for restricting when larger ships can enter or leave harbour.

[frogspawner]

Originally Posted by Sven Norén

Do we need tides at all?

Yes, quite. Ditto seasons? This is just the sort of big-scale thing we should be deciding now.

OTOH, maybe there should be details like that from the RW, but they have different, weird causes.

Which is it easier for GMs to have - normal tides/seasons/etc (to have to keep track of) or weird/none? (remembering a lack of normal ones might be even harder!). Now I'm thinking maybe they should be intermittent (at the whim of the gods?). No worries about tracking them, no limits on using them as plot devices!

PS: If there are no tides, what would clear the sandcastles away?

[Atgxtg]

Originally Posted by Trifletraxor

What about the world being an enormous habitat on a huge grown living ship, slowly propelling through space?

Well, its a bit more Sci-Fi than expected for this but going with the basic idea how about:

1)It isn't a ship, it's a Dyson Sphere. That would give us enough space to literally encompass any culture.

2) There is no magic, just Clark's 3rd law in effect. That is it is really all high tech, but the inhabitants can't tell the difference, because it is much more advanced than they can comprehend.

3) Everybody could have latent PSI abilities that are really the power behind magical effects. Sort of a will of the subconscious masses at work. They just don't know it.


4) Many of the religions could have sprung up around things the Ancients did before they vanished. Miracles are also the "will of the subconscious masses" at work.

5) Perhaps the Ancients aren't gone, just that they don't show up to much because they are busy, or don't want to ruin the experiment, or both. They could be very long lived, perhaps even immortal.

6) With the size of a Dyson Sphere, any low tech culture would think that the world was flat. So we could take a section of it, surround it by water and ice, and people will think that is the entire world, and that the world is flat. And for all practical purposes be able to prove it.


7) Gates could be a way for the Ancients to move about quickly between different spots in the sphere. They could be high tech, and/or powered by mental abilities (well magic as far as we are concerned).

8) The "HellGate" concept is entirely compatible with the Dyson Sphere. The Ancients would be the Ancient Culture (or maybe an offshoot), and the gate just went somewhere on the sphere where nasty things dwell.

9) This concept would also allow for pockets of technology of variating levels.


10) Non-humans and monsters could be alien life forms collected and/or the results of generic manipulation, or even mutation caused by radiation.

11) Moons could still exist and there could be gates to go to them, Some could be terraformed and serve as pocket dimensions like "the otherworld" of Earth's legends.