Happy Accidents

[Aldarion]

So what happy accidents did you have when worldbuilding?

For me, I got served very well by my pedantry. You see, my original setting was basically Ottoman-Hungarian wars but with Western Roman Empire in place of Hungary, and all of that turned into fantasy equivalents. And no feudalism, because I am kinda sick of your typical fantasy feudal medievalism with lords, tourneys and stuff, but the added complication of the undead rising. Think some weird crossover of Game of Thrones White Walkers, Fire Emblem Awakening Risen and Norse draugr.

But in order to justify survival of my WRE-equivalent in a pseudo-Byzantine form as opposed to your typical feudalism, I couldn't have it nearly fall due to barbarian migrations as in the real world. Besides, I didn't want to copy history one-for-one, much less copy Tolkien and Fall of Arnor.

So... I actually do not remember how it happened exactly, but somehow, I came across the Irish legends about Fomorians. And this basically solved it for me! Instead of barbarian migrations, there would be Fomorian conquest. And it turned out, tales about that could in fact be more interesting than tales about the zombie apocalypse.

I am planning on writing about both, but I think I will be focusing more on Fomorian stuff than the undead stuff.

Did you have any similar experiences, where you had basically an accident in worldbuilding that hit "just right"?

 

[Finchbearer]

I think much of creativity is about happy accidents.

From my own experiences so far of worldbuilding and storytelling, I’d say that the further it’s developed, that has gone a long way to do the work for me in ways that have been surprising. Making connections that I wouldn’t have otherwise made just through worldbuilding alone has created those happy accidents.

 

[pmmg]

So far, I am hoping most of book 4 will end up being a happy accident

I agree with Finch.

Sometimes I just toss it onto the page and wonder were this will go. Often, I can mold it into something nice that adds depth and intrigue... But its also nice to know where things are going too. I could use a little more of that at present.