Building a World of Beastkins, Humans, Sorcery, and some comedy

[prodigousdialect]

I would like help building a world that's basically "Harry Potter" meets "Sonic the Hedgehog" in a setting that's inspired by World of Warcraft. I know it sounds amateurish but I suck at creating worlds. It is for a young adult book series I want to do that revolves around an anthropomorphic Cat Mage named Cheshire.

 

[WooHooMan]

Do you have some idea what the story is going to be? Maybe, tell us about the main character's arc.

 

[prodigousdialect]

Well he and his comrades of the Five Phases Guild (they each are Mages of an element; Cheshire is the Mage of Fire) are destined to protect areas called Akashic Points, which act as magical nodes. Right now, there isn't an overarching plot but one can be developed. Cheshire himself does his best to keep the balance of Sorcery with his friends.

 

[WooHooMan]

Ok, which elements of Harry Potter, Sonic the Hedgehog and World of Warcraft were you hoping to have in your setting?

 

[prodigousdialect]

From Harry Potter, the different types of Factions and how the public at large don't understand sorcery.

From Sonic, all major characters are anthropomorphic animals and it's a bit cartoony.

And World of Warcraft, i love the vast world and lore.

 

[WooHooMan]

Ok, to throw some ideas out:

The cosmology of this setting is divided into two planes: a material plane (the World) and an ethereal plane (the Akashic). Like how the rain falls from the sky onto the ground, magic flows from the Akashic onto the World and a kind of harvested at the Akashic points.
If magic operates like Warcraft or Harry Potter, those who have some ability to cultivate magic would have some kind of great sociopolitical power.

So, the factions could be built around different interpretations around the use of mages; an anti-magic faction, an authoritarian mage faction, a non-interventionist mage faction, a magic school and so forth.

 

[prodigousdialect]

Yeah I like that. I even wrote that the Five Phases Guild were aligned with the World Government because of their efforts to maintain balance in both worlds.

I like your ideas - how can we move on from this?

 

[WooHooMan]

The most important thing is ethos. Your world needs a tone and attitude.
I would recommend looking for some pictures of how you envision your world looking.
Or maybe make a list of words meant to sum-up the feel for the place.

Like for Conan the Barbarian, you'd say the setting is "savage, primitive, primal, barbaric, harsh, grim". To summarize the look, you may find some pictures of steppes or mountains, neolithic structures and bronze age ruins.
And then you can get the gist for the type of people who live there and the type of life they have.

 

[prodigousdialect]

List of words...
Shonen, a bit light hearted, not afraid to mix seriousness with comedy...

 

[valiant12]

Well he and his comrades of the Five Phases Guild (they each are Mages of an element; Cheshire is the Mage of Fire)

Maybe you should use some elements different from the classical 5.




[url]http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/SoYouWantTo/WriteAShonenSeries
[/URL]
I think this will help with your book

 

[prodigousdialect]

I know that particular page quite well, and I'm using the five Chinese elements: Fire, Earth, Wood, Metal, and Water.

 

[WooHooMan]

List of words...
Shonen, a bit light hearted, not afraid to mix seriousness with comedy...

Ok, not much to work with. "Serious with comedy" is a contradiction so even if that's true, there's not much guidance. "A bit light hearted" is vague. I don't like shonen but that's a fine place to start.

Shonen, more or less, has its origins in wuxia. First of the North Star is wuxia mixed with Mad Max, Dragon Ball started out as a standard wuxia. That plus your use of using the five elements system would point to China as your best source of inspiration.

Wuxia would often be all about martial arts. Like the world centers on martial arts. This is why shonen settings seem to be totally centered on whatever the hero is doing (Naruto's setting is centered on ninjutsu, pokemon's setting is totally focused on Pokemon catching, and so forth).
So, take wuxia, replace martial arts with magic and replace temples/monasteries with some kind of magical institutions.

China has a long history of faction intrigue (martial arts sects, religions, the 100 schools of thought, warring states, rebels against the imperial dynasty, warlordism, etc.).

So, I recommend Chinese fantasy and history as a good basis for this story's setting.
Journey to the West is the best place to start with wuxia. So, I recommend researching that, maybe watch one of its numerous adaptations.

 

[prodigousdialect]

I actually have extensive knowledge about Wuxia, like how G Gundam was based on "The Smiling Proud Wanderer." When I said serious with a bit of comedy, I should have said more of a feel of Dragonball, how things didn't get serious until down the line.

 

[WooHooMan]

When I said serious with a bit of comedy, I should have said more of a feel of Dragonball, how things didn't get serious until down the line.

I know what you mean. But it still doesn't give much guidance when it comes to the look and feel of your setting.

 

[prodigousdialect]

All right, how about the feel that's present in World of Warcraft? Is that a better example?

 

[WooHooMan]

All right, how about the feel that's present in World of Warcraft? Is that a better example?

I couldn't tell you. I don't know much about World of Warcraft.

 

[prodigousdialect]

I thought of using the world of Avatar as an inspiration.

 

[WooHooMan]

I assume you mean Avatar the Last Airbender.
I kind of get the impression that you'd just end-up using the Avatar setting as a proxy for getting some influence from real-world China. I'd suggest cutting-out the middle man and just using Imperial China as an influence.
Unless there's something specific you would like to lift from Avatar's setting.

 

[prodigousdialect]

I like the spiritual aspect, as well as the factions from The Last Airbender as well as Legend of Korra. That's where i got the idea of the Akashic Points from.

 

[WooHooMan]

I like the spiritual aspect, as well as the factions from The Last Airbender as well as Legend of Korra. That's where i got the idea of the Akashic Points from.

Well, there you go.
It sounds like you just need to figure the Akashic Points out (and how magic works) and then build from there.
Magic's probably a pretty big deal in the setting so the factions can be built from there.