"Sword & Planet" Genre World Building

[Isaac]

If you don't know what "Sword & Planet" is, that's basically stuff like "John Carter of Mars" or "Flash Gordon", where a human from Earth is stranded on an alien world usually with medieval themes or so.

I don't know the name of the alien world yet, but I do know that there are 4 kingdoms ruled by 4 different alien races, all of them humanoids like those you might see in Star Trek, combined with certain aspects of races like Elves, Dwarves, Orcs, etc. found in Lord of the Rings.

I don't know many details beyond that, but can I ask for help with this, please?

I'm open to brainstorming ideas if necessary.

 

[Orc Knight]

Since you started with the John Carter of Mars, the one I'm most familiar with, are you planning the races sort of in the way he had his Martians set up? With more or less clothing? Not that you can get much less clothing. Anyways. And how's the mighty hero going to trip into the world? Or is he going to crash land in a rocket ship? These can also start jumping into other style stories of the classic sorts too.

 

[Malik]

Well, if you want a modern take, you can read my books, which are about a pair of swordsmen from 21st-Century Earth who end up on a planet inhabited by creatures from Earth's mythical past.

Me pointing out that I've written this is absolutely not to say that you shouldn't write it. This is by no means an original idea, and there's lots of room for everyone. Glory Road, The Chronicles of Amber, and Three Hearts and Three Lions all follow pretty much the same concept.

I did put a spin on it for my series: I went the military technothriller route, using modern action thriller voicing and pacing (and even an editor who'd worked on bestselling thrillers) and went heavy on the tech and ancient schools of swordplay in order to do a Tom Clancy thing with it. It's pretty much The Hunt for Red October but for knights in armor instead of submarines.

Like I said, there's a lot of room in this genre, and if you look around, you'll see it's practically untouched right now. If I had to guess, I'd say it's been overlooked by the YA/UF craze and a tidal wave of Harry Potter/Chosen One/Magical Kid Comes Of Age In A World Of Magic And Wonder plotlines. All I can suggest is that you read as much as you can, avoid that bullshit, and forge your own path forward once you've seen how other authors handled it. Like I said, you might have to read back a ways. Also, there's a ton of research and craft on my blog, and I'm all over the Research section of these forums.

Hit me up with any questions, and have fun.

 

[ThinkerX]

This is something like the core background in my current tales:

Ancient Aliens terraformed a number of planets, imported other races (including humans) as servants and experimental subjects, then got mostly wiped out by Lovecraftian entities, leaving the other races on their own, more or less. Story time, the ancient aliens have been out of the picture for several thousand years, though much of their tech lingers on. Oh, and because their tech was partly PSI based, the AA genetically implanted their favored servants with potent psionic abilities, whose descendants became the first wizards. Current era...there are characters who move from world to world, including some who've spent time on earth, but they're not exactly central figures...at least in the current stories.

 

[Saigonnus]

I had a thought a while back. A story about an average, modern man who dies in a tragic accident. Instead of death, he wakes up in an alternate reality (with magic, strange creatures and so on) in the body of a local warlord that had been killed, but with his own skills and memories. I haven’t done much with the idea, but it is interesting how many ways you can potentially write up a “Connecticut yankee in King Arthur’s court” kind of story.

 

[LordWarGod]

If you don't know what "Sword & Planet" is, that's basically stuff like "John Carter of Mars" or "Flash Gordon", where a human from Earth is stranded on an alien world usually with medieval themes or so.

I don't know the name of the alien world yet, but I do know that there are 4 kingdoms ruled by 4 different alien races, all of them humanoids like those you might see in Star Trek, combined with certain aspects of races like Elves, Dwarves, Orcs, etc. found in Lord of the Rings.

I don't know many details beyond that, but can I ask for help with this, please?

I'm open to brainstorming ideas if necessary.

If your alien races are still in the medieval era then perhaps it would help to think outside the box when it comes to what kinds of weapons they have, the architecture of their buildings and clothing. That would give you an interesting edge that not many others have with similar worlds to this. It would also create some interesting dynamics culturally, economically and militarily. Different materials require different methods of mining and refining these things.

You could create an interesting backstory on how all these alien races are actually descendants of the human race, evolved or altered through their technology. They spread across the stars and colonize planets. Then some kind of war, conflict or disaster happens which separates them and causes them to revert back to medieval age technology. Then you have your strange world where there are seemingly different races all with unique traits in their culture and architecture.