How many countries does your world have?

[Prince of Spires]

I'm at 3 named ones in my current project. Those are the only ones that feature in the story. There's stuff beyond the borders, it just doesn't get a name (unless I'm inspired then I note it on my map). I'm very much a "make it up when it becomes necessary" world builder.

I've also had a world with a dozen or so city states in close proximity. And one which was only a single empire + an invading nation. It's really just what the story requires.

 

[Gallio]

Hundreds. The human peoples there prefer to live in small, usually clan-based communities. Even the cities are conglomerations of semi-independent suburbs. Anything like a larger state or an empire actually turns out to be a voluntary confederation of smaller states, when examined more closely. I'm not sure why this is the case though. Perhaps a slight genetic difference from earthly humans?

 

[Gurkhal]

As both my "worlds" in Antiquity and in the Long 19th Century spans many interconnected lands/planets I have pretty much potential countries in the thousands.

 

[skip.knox]

Altearth follows the general political geography of real Earth, but with some major modifications. Most of my stories have a pseudo-medieval setting, so the very notion of a "country" is not terribly useful. Entities like town, village, valley, neighborhood, are all more serviceable. Even better is pays. That's French, but I think there are analogues in other languages. Interestingly, the closest in English is indeed "country" but with more of connection to "countryside".

In that sense, a country is where everyone speaks not merely the same language but the same dialect. They have a collection of words unique to them, not found elsewhere. They have the same diet and even if an outsider might say that dish is the same here as elsewhere, the locals will insist it is different. In fact, it's not strange to find a local becoming physically when traveling to another country. That other country might have the same king, but that matters not at all. Kings and governments do not map onto countries like they do in modern times.

So, with one orientation, I might say there are a score or two of countries in Altearth, with another orientation I would say there are hundreds. I don't worry about them unless my characters happen to pass through or near one. Or encounter someone coming from another.

This is all just accounting for humans. Dwarves have their own political geography, as do trolls, and orcs. Elves and ogres have their own social organization but do not have governments the way humans understand them. And of course pixies are anarchists.

 

[BiggusBeardus]

I've decided to go with what I'm calling "realms." They aren't necessarily countries with centralized governments and borders are tenuous at best. There may be some city-states that control part of a realm, or there may just be "primitive" tribes that are dominant in an area. But there are only a few actual countries.

I'm sticking with my post-apocalyptic idea, but the world has recovered a lot and is habitable again, but civilization was still pretty much "reset" so things like technology and such have not caught back up yet.

That's something I'm stuck on right now. The world before the cataclysm was highly advanced in science and technology and whatever. But how much have they recovered? In my original notes, this one valley (last civilized place in the world) had this magic-based technology and society there was pretty advanced while the rest of the world was living in the dark ages. I'm hesitant to make things that advanced now. I want magic to be "mystical" and amazing, not a commodity. Healing is also tripping me up. I can't decide about how powerful magical healing should be.

Thanks everyone for your responses. I like bouncing ideas around with people.

 

[Aldarion]

They aren't necessarily countries with centralized governments and borders are tenuous at best.

That is literally every single premodern country... I don't see need to make a difference. Realm is a country, although emphasis is on who is ruling it, as realm is a "field of interest" - so basically all lands that a ruler controls.

Also, I have written on medieval politics before - you may find it interesting, or even give you ideas:

Basic mistakes in worldbuilding a "feudal" monarchy

"Feudal" monarchy seems to be the most popular type of government in fantasy - to the point that other systems are often confused for it (e.g. Gondor being called feudal) - yet it is so very often done so, so badly. So I will list some of the basic mistakes I had noticed: Overly powerful...

mythicscribes.com

 

[skip.knox]

>I'm hesitant to make things that advanced now. I want magic to be "mystical" and amazing,
I'm sure I'm not the only one who immediately thought of Arthur C. Clarke's famous dictum. In the setting you describe, I can easily see "scientific" devices and methods being regarded by other peoples as the work of wizards commanding powerful magic. That way, you get to have both, and can exploit both perceptions of the same act or object, depending on the needs of the story.

 

[LittleOwlbear]

There are no countries like we would call them today, aka no national states.
There are five bigger continents, plus some islands, that include kingdoms and also territories of more secluded tribes or small "kingdoms". It's hard to say, ca. 20? But I didn't go in depth with most of them yet.

I put kingdoms in quotation marks, because a few are not monarchies, they are more like parliamentary pseudo-monarchies. One of the kingdoms I'm writing in has one united government and the different species often are ignoring this in some parts, still making up their own form of hierarchies etc, or the lack of strict hierarchies.

Most people, especially those in towns and villages outside the center, just don't care much about who's officially in power as long as their life quality doesn't suffer from it, and have their own way of organizing themselves.

 

[BiggusBeardus]

That is literally every single premodern country... I don't see need to make a difference. Realm is a country, although emphasis is on who is ruling it, as realm is a "field of interest" - so basically all lands that a ruler controls.

Also, I have written on medieval politics before - you may find it interesting, or even give you ideas:

Basic mistakes in worldbuilding a "feudal" monarchy

"Feudal" monarchy seems to be the most popular type of government in fantasy - to the point that other systems are often confused for it (e.g. Gondor being called feudal) - yet it is so very often done so, so badly. So I will list some of the basic mistakes I had noticed: Overly powerful...

mythicscribes.com

Your other post is very informative. However, I am not using a feudal setting, nor a pseudo-medieval fantasy setting. And I'm definitely not trying to imitate historical reality in any sense of the word.

This is a world that was formerly similar to our own, or more like a futuristic version of our own world (with magic). A magical calamity destroyed 1/3rd of the world's surface and nearly killed all life. Some how (probably magic or gods or something), people lived and they have rebuilt civilization. There may be "kings" or "lords", but that does not mean they have a formal feudal system. They are just titles, probably taken on by the ruler themselves. If they are particularly pompous they may be called something like Grand Master, or Supreme High Lord. None of it matters. They are just the person in charge. People have reformed their own versions of government, and, while I must use real world examples as my model (since I exist in the real world and don't know anything else), I am not trying to accurately recreate any particular version of real world politics/governments.

All that being said, if I do decide to write something with a feudal system, I will take your notes into consideration. You were very thorough.

The word "realm" is another name for kingdom or country, but I'm not using it in that literal sense. It is just a word that deviates from "country" enough for fantasy fiction. Plus it sounds cool. Domain is another I may use. Again, it just sounds cool. As it stands right now, my story doesn't have anything to do with politics or government. I'm just creating a basic backdrop for the macro-setting.

Thanks for your response!

 

[BiggusBeardus]

>I'm hesitant to make things that advanced now. I want magic to be "mystical" and amazing,
I'm sure I'm not the only one who immediately thought of Arthur C. Clarke's famous dictum. In the setting you describe, I can easily see "scientific" devices and methods being regarded by other peoples as the work of wizards commanding powerful magic. That way, you get to have both, and can exploit both perceptions of the same act or object, depending on the needs of the story.

Yeah, I'm familiar with the quote. Hell, I joke about our cell "phones" being magic all the time! LOL

The current technology, as I have it right now, is technically the work of wizards. They have a hand in building it. The more I developed it though, the more advanced this one civilization got. They had electricity and radio and such. All powered by magic. And it started to take away from "actual" magic in my mind.

But thanks for the encouragement to use both. Sometimes I just need a little push.

 

[BiggusBeardus]

There are no countries like we would call them today, aka no national states.
There are five bigger continents, plus some islands, that include kingdoms and also territories of more secluded tribes or small "kingdoms". It's hard to say, ca. 20? But I didn't go in depth with most of them yet.

I put kingdoms in quotation marks, because a few are not monarchies, they are more like parliamentary pseudo-monarchies. One of the kingdoms I'm writing in has one united government and the different species often are ignoring this in some parts, still making up their own form of hierarchies etc, or the lack of strict hierarchies.

Most people, especially those in towns and villages outside the center, just don't care much about who's officially in power as long as their life quality doesn't suffer from it, and have their own way of organizing themselves.

Most people don't care is where mine is at too. There are some areas that are ruled by evil demon lords, so those people may not be treated well, but most of the places are so loosely governed, the common person doesn't even notice.

 

[Nighty_Knight]

Right now.

73

5 Empires, which have a number of countries in each.

So not including the ones within each Empire, I have
5 Empires
7 Kingdoms
4 Sultonates
1 Republic Principality
1 under a knight order
3 under a number of different rulers, chiefs, or tribes
4 City states

So 25 if you just count the Empires as 1.


1 Empire in my story for example has 3 kingdoms, 3 Principalities, 4 Grand Duchies, 2 Republics, 1 sovereign Duchy, 5 sovereign counties, and 22 city states. That is the largest Empire country wise (not land mass wise)

I had to fix my math a few times.

 

[Devor]

There are five countries on my map, which covers one peninsula of a wider world that doesn’t matter much.

The five countries have a shared history. One of them was an empire and invader, hundreds of years ago, which brought in some outside influences. Another of the countries fancies itself a country of the world, bringing more of that outside influence. So the world is present. But it’s not where the story is. I haven’t mapped it. I sometimes think I’d like to outline the shape of the continent as a cut out box for my map. But it would just be for show.

 

[Naruzeldamaster]

Currently there are 7, technically 8 if we count the moon as one of the countries. (it's where the OG elves went after they got bored of short life species, leaving their descendants to clean up their mess) and the comet observatory kinda counts but I'm not sure on that.
There's one for each major species of 'human(elf, dwarf, faerie etc)' and a couple of other locations.

Haven't really fleshed them out much other than some key locations like the Carbon Tundra in the desert kingdom. It's called the Carbon Tundra cause the sand isn't really sand, it's a rare black mineral that when forged turns snow white (hence the name) Also it's called that these days because the current king thinks it's a really cool name. (Yes I'm serious)

 

[Miles Lacey]

Around three hundred countries exist. They range from tiny city-states not unlike Hong Kong or Singapore in our world to sprawling empires that are made up of large areas of sparsely inhabited or uninhabited areas not unlike the former Soviet Union in our world.

There are also International Zones which are territories that are controlled by two or more countries. A real world equivalent of this would be the Tangiers International Zone that operated between the 1920s and the 1950s.

The story is mostly set in the Banjari Empire which is a maritime Empire that is made up of tropical islands of various sizes. Politically it's divided as follows:

Provinces: These are administered directly from the Imperial Capital.
Territories: These are administered by an appointed Governor and an elected Territorial Assembly. They have limited self-government.
Protectorates: These are fully self-governing countries that have signed a Treaty of Union with the Empire. This means the country has entered into a currency, customs and defence union with the Empire but otherwise it controls its own affairs.

 

[SirenSon117]

In terms of Galfreeze Project as a whole, my friend it's not a matter of countries... It's a matter of planets and their continents. Most of my worlds have continent-spanning empires because that's an easy surface layer to make for deeper worldbuilding on the regional and city scale. Some Planets, like Ferrum Aquilo, are City Planets where one nation has managed to conquer everything. Some planets are part of "worldguilds" which are basically multiple galaxy spanning empires, federations, alliances, confederacies, schools, or actual guilds! Then you have the world beyond Physical Reality, all the funky supernatural alternate dimensions! Also alternate timelines, bubble realities, and the like. It's fun and I'm a Kentaro Miura level perfectionist so I'll never be done!

 

[MauEvig]

Let's see...
Sky Kingdom itself is a country, with Talonhold being a neighboring rival country.
There's also Nekojin, Rodentia and Primatia.
So at least 5, but likely more in that world itself. Maybe 6...if you count Leotropic. But some are just mentions.
Sky Kingdom and Rodentia are where the main character will spend the most time, and a brief amount of time on Nekojin and surrounding islands.
There's most definitely more but those are the main off the top of my head, but those are just the ones that are mentioned in the story.

 

[~Theletos~]

There are 24 different nations for twenty four different races in my story.

 

[Raarti]

I want my world to go from small tribal societies to a centralized world government over its history. But I'm in the initial stages of planning my world and story.

 

[Malik]

They don't know. The area where my series takes place has three countries (using the loosest possible definition; it's effectively Germanic tribal law holding strings of held territories in alignment), an elf sanctuary/homeland that many believe is only a rumor, one breakaway republic who may or may not belong to one of the countries depending on whom you ask, and a couple of principalities owned by the largest country that have the same problems as everybody else: a limited rule of law. The outlying areas are teetering on the edge of administrative collapse, and it gets more factious the further you drift from the seats of power. Way out in the hinterlands, it's basically Somalia with swords.

That said, it's surrounded on three sides by mountains and the fourth by an impassable sea, with one small bottleneck leading to a desert, and no one has any clue what's on the other side. To them, this little corner of the planet (they don't even know it's a planet) is "the world," but it's about the size of Montana. Nobody who ventures over the far mountains, into the desert, or out into the sea ever comes back. And nobody ever comes from there. And that's fine with them.