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A few concepts I'm bouncing around, if you have a minute

hi y'all, just three things I'm thinking about whilst properly defining the world of many of my tales (I have plots and short stories, but I want it down much more concrete before starting on something full length) and I'd like some feedback/ideas about if its not too much trouble :)

1) my world has four "realms" - worlds if you may - that are all interlinked, but three of them are unstable due to the collapse of the fifth in the past. the seecence of each is leaking into the others, threatening to destroy the origionator of the seecence etc. as well, this creates conflict between the three realms, as by activly taking the energy of the others is the most tested and safest way to ensure ones own realm's survival (there are other ways, but they're risky. I'm just wondering if this seems to contrived to be beliveable, or too abstract?

2) The realms mentioned above each bear aspects, but I'm having trouble deciding on one of the aspects of one of them. Anyone have any suggestions for an opposite of change other than stability that dosen't bear openly negative connotations. any ideas?

3) I'm considering usin an actual form of the consorvation of ninjutsu in the worlds magical system - with magic being using the eccence around you to create effects (its not consumed, just rendered temporarily inert). just wondering of thoughts on this?

thanks for reading/answering if you do :D
 

Ankari

Hero Breaker
Moderator
1).. I like the idea of multiple plains of existence (I use it in the my universe)... The question for you to hammer out is "what is the essence of each realm? " and "how is it leaking to the other realms? "

2). By Aspects you mean like the D& Design model? Like Plane of Fire or Realm of Dreams?

3).. I have an idea of what you're suggesting, but can you expand on your magic system concept?
 

Zophos

Minstrel
1) I wouldn't say that it is too contrived to be believable, but it could be a bear to keep track of for the reader. It seems like it's a plot device, so it is fairly significant. When you say "creates conflict" do you mean personal conflict, as in the denizens of each realm can affect the transition, or do you mean cosmological, as in the realms themselves are in conflict?

2) By opposite of stability, do you mean something like entropy? It is generally regarded as chaos, randomness or disorder, but is important because it has a bearing on which direction a process takes. I think the answer to this question depends on what it is you are defining as stable and what measure you are using to determine that stability.

3) I've seen magical systems similar to this before. They seem like they work so long as something (energy, matter, something more abstract) is conserved. The conservation of heat energy in a storm, for example, displays itself as lightening when clouds rise through the dew point, condense and release energy as they change state. As such, the world around your magician becoming more "inert" may not be the best description of what's going on. If you make magical fire, it should get cold someplace as that energy is channeled into a magical effect.

Sounds interesting and suitably complicated to keep your reader's attention. Just don't spill the beans all at once and make sure you show vice tell.
 
1) The esscence of each world is, at its base, the life of it. without it, the realm is left dead and lifeless, ended and crumbling, just an empty husk. As the eccence of a world leaks out - or is taken - life on the world begins to wear thin, sickness, famine etc increases and less creatures are born until eventually it stops. This effect still extnds to those born of the realm residing in other realms, which makes simply fleeing to the stable plane not a solution.
The essence of the world is contained within the materials from it, from the land to the life to the air, or it was, until the catastrophy which left a void esscence tries to fill but is lost in, and then the esscence lost in this way is filld with esscence migrated to it from another plane and so on and so forth...
As for how its leaking to the other realms, well, imagine you had a pool with partitians between segments. Now imagine one of the segments was emptied by something with enough force to crack the other partitians, leading for the contents to leak into the others - or into the fully broken tank, being lost (forgot to mention that before). Thats the closest analogy I can think of to describe it. And like in a pool, you can take same of the water from one section and put it in the others if you need to.
But its dangerous to let to much esscence mix from different realms in one as it risks forcing them to merge, which is what caused the catastrophy. As such the cracked walls cannot simply be removed and replaced without severe risk to existance, but due to the nature of the walls its all but impossible to repair them with anything but temporary fixes and dams
hope that makes sense.

2) In a way, kind off, but not to the same extreme - DnD has the relams pretty much made of thir aspect, here the Aspect is much more ephasized (as a note, Earth's aspects are stability and creation for refrence), rather than replacing everything. The aspects here are also more concepts than objects (change as opposed to fire etc). Even in a world with the aspect of Destruction though, its still possible to create something etc.
For exaple, on of my realms, Charon, has the Aspects of Change and Destruction, rather than DnDs fire etc. The realm itself is highly unstable in terms of landmass and weather, shifting much more violently and rapidly than our own, but also being rebuilt up at a faster rate - whereas on earth it would take millenia to watch a mountain rise or a trench form (without natural disstaters of course), on Charon it can take a little under a decade to see a mountain rise from the ground, or to watch a coastline shift. but of course there is still things like landmass and water and flora/fauna (different to earth, but simmilar enough) etc.

3) Right, well, at the moment the magic system I have works a bit like this (paraprhased because the version in my plan is...substantially longer): "Magic" is a system of accessing the eccence of the world around you and drawing power from it to aid in tasks or actions. Anyone can access this energy, and it is accessed by willpower and mindset, depending on what is to be done. For most, this power is drawn to them as an unnoticable boost to what they set their minds too; if their determination is to get somewhere quiickly, they'll move faster or if their determination was to answer a question/complete something they'll be better able to do so.
It is possible to awaken ones self to a higher level of magic, however; this can be done through practice and study, neccecitiyif its the only way to survive, or by making a pact and sharing ones essence with a being from another realm. Awakened beings - known quoucially as wizards, mages etc - are capable of harnessing the nature of the essence around themselves to produce more potent and non-personal effects, with their aptitude lying in abilities tied to their personality mostly, but infulenced the nature of ther Realm; for example, your average human's powers naturally tend towards cration and stability before personality, but their personality ovverides. However, in most cases a mage will show more aptitude in abilities of their Realm's Aspects even if they are not their speciality. These effects are potentially unlimited, though large actions are dangerous, fickle and unreliable.
Magic is cast using the energy from the realm's essence around you, and this in a way regulates what can be done at one point. To use magic, the desired part of the essence around you is amplified by emotion (eg: agressiveness will amplify destructive energy) and then that is consumed in the spell, leaving it temporarily inert; the used energy will eventually regain its power, but whilst inert it cannot be used. At the same time, it is possible to charge the essence around you with an emotion but not cast a spell, leaving it charged. Places were magic has been cast/prepared retain an air around them based on what was used; the site of a great destructive spell often feels peaceful and sorrowful, the anger in the air used up. conversly, the site of a fierce battle without any magic being used will often retain much of the feeling of rage and tension in the air.
In regards to the mixing of essence mentioned before, this in general produces the most potent of magical effects, but using these powers can have disasterous reprocutions on the user - ranging from insanity to physical changes based on the gifted essence to cecitation of existance in extreme cases.
 

Caliburn

New Member
Hey I like the concepts as opposed to objects for your planes I think that is interesting especially the combination of aspects. It can be hard working with that stuff because for me I would want them all to line up correctly but you also want to have a few things that break the synergy ie have one or two planes that don't have a matched pair. At least that's how I tend to view it. The reader will look for the patterns but if there is too much synergy it will seem stale, too little and it will seem baffling.

I reckon Zophos' remark about different kinds of stability was spot on. If you have one realm that tends to change and one that tends toward stability, what is the status quo that the latter plane defaults to? Is it possible to dig a little deeper than stability or unchanging-ness? I'm not sure. And what about the more chaotic plane; how is it's mutability expressed?

Maybe think of change vs stability as a starting point then try and add layers to it that are unique to each plane? ie two planes of stability could be different.

I dig the magic concept you have because it is well-linked to the planar concept and could manifest unique secondary effects depending on the plane you are on if I assume correct? Its also just interesting in general since I know little about this Ninjitsu style of magic. The emotional part is cool, would love empower healing magic?
 
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