Rebecca Hb. (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
beckyh2112) wrote2011-01-02 11:13 pm
beckyh2112) wrote2011-01-02 11:13 pm
Entry tags:
Original World Pitches
Part of what I want to do in 2011 is write more original fiction. However, I often get myself in the catch-22 of knowing the world but not the characters, or knowing the characters and not the world, and then deciding I need to do more research. NO, what I need to do is WRITE MORE OF THEM. I tend to hack things out better when I write.
So, I want to do request-memes for some of my original 'verses to try to get things moving in my headspace. To figure out which one I want to do first, I'm going with the tried and true method of having a poll.
Crater'verse
A planet that has been smacked by a comet in the deep past. There's a large central continent surrounded by a more-or-less ring of islands. In between the islands and the continent are the sailing cities of the Tiderunners. On the islands dwell the various kingdoms and empires of the Taiyo. The continent belongs to the Terratics, who currently have one of their kings trying to conquer the entire continent. (This happens periodically throughout their history.)
This world has X-gene-linked elemental magic. In the Taiyo, this expresses as fire; in the Tiderunners, water; and in the Terratics, earth, wood, and metal. The world is approximately late medieval/early Renaissance in terms of technology, and the flavor is definitely Eastern and First Nations. (YES, I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE THINKING.)
General belief is that daughters get their magics from their fathers, and sons get it from their mothers. Since most people marry among their own peoples, most women just get doubles of the same elemental magic gene. (This is a bit tricky among Terratics, since they have three different genes.) However, it is possible for a girl to be able to manipulate two elements. The cultural assumptions tend to lead to very few people ever realizing it.
There are air-related elemental magics that can be gained if one is sufficiently spiritually-devoted. There doesn't seem to be a restriction on what one is spiritually-devoted to; a Terratic nun of the Compassionate One can gain the Divine Breath as easily as a Taiyo high priest of the Southern Hummingbird.
As mentioned, one of the Terratic kings is trying to conquer his neighbors and is generally succeeding. His eldest son, Taizi, is an earthcrafter with a nun who returned her vows as his wife. Nima possesses the Divine Breath as well as a specialized form of earthcrafting that lets her manipulate gems. Her eldest daughter is awaiting marriage to her third betrothed in as many years, while her younger daughter spends her time with the royal tutors. Their son is between the two girls in age and attending to the last year of his officer-training.
The king's youngest son has just returned from attaining the Divine Breath as a monk dedicated to the Balance. He awaits marriage to the daughter of a volcano spirit.
Meanwhile, in the eastern Taiyo islands, a daimyo has discovered his third daughter can shape water as well as fire.
In the western Taiyo islands, there is a need for a Terratic "butterfly" (prisoner of war) to placate the Southern Hummingbird. Given the extreme distances between the islands and the continent, this is going to require enlisting the help of the Tiderunners to get there and back.
The Swan Angel
Chad, a semi-professional musician in New Orleans, finds an angel in a park one night. Said angel takes the form of a mute swan most of the time, but he saw it as it was. He wants to help it - as near as he can get out of it, it's trapped on Earth because of its muteness. It needs to produce the musics of Heaven to let the others know where it is.
Like all angels, the swan angel is frightening and dangerous, but it likes Chad, and he likes it even if it does scare him.
Eztli and the Lines
There's a National Geographic article that proposes the Nazca lines as being ritually walked to bring the necessary rains that would allow the Nazca to survive in their harsh environment. This has stuck with me for a while.
This is a secondary world fantasy that uses the lines as ritually walked paths to perform various religious functions. If one has the knowledge, one can use them for more than just ensuring the continuance of the rain and the goodwill of the deities.
Eztli suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder due to possession by a demon. She has a friend who keeps her somewhat steady, and a tattoo on her thigh to keep the demon from getting back into her head. It's not easy for a demon to possess people - the two minds don't mesh well, so the fact she got out of it with her sanity intact enough for her to still be functional makes her very interesting to the horrors in the world.
Fae New Orleans
Kim-Long Nguyen is a demi-fae Vietnamese girl living in New Orleans. Her grandfather was a stromkarl, and she inherited a touch of the music magic from him and a lot of the water magic. She's too embroiled in the local court to live a normal life, and she knows it. As a demi-fae, she can safely handle iron, which is important to fae in a modern city.
She's recently found a changeling of similar age to her who hasn't the foggiest clue of living in the human world, for all he's much more powerful than her with fae magics. The Unseelie are stirring for the first time in decades, the selkie prince has lost his meteoric iron blade, and the not-quite-fae who've also immigrated to New Orleans are difficult as hell to deal with.
Oh, and her grandfather is back in her life again.
(This one seriously does need more research, but it also needs me to play with the characters.)
The Gay Furry Porn
Another secondary-fantasy world. There are eight great spirit-bloodlines that run through the peoples of the world: dragon and phoenix, wolf and snake, badger and unicorn, and bison and crane. They produce near-humans with limited magical powers and animal traits. The spirit blood also tends to emphasize a particular negative personality trait. Spirit-bloods breed true with humans but they don't breed very much. They're definitely a minority population, rare to uncommon depending on the area but not unheard of.
The dragons and phoenixes are uniquely linked in that a phoenix is always a second child of a dragon. Not all dragons have phoenixes as second children, but the ones who do will not produce any more children after the phoenix.
Phoenixes and dragons possess wings - feathered and scaled, respectively. Dragons breathe fire and have invulnerable wings. Phoenixes live until they die of old age. Nothing else can kill them - they'll self-resurrect from death wounds and never get sick. Dragons are known to be extremely selfish, phoenixes to be extremely cruel.
Wolves posses wolf ears and wolf tail. Their teeth are much sharper than normal for humans but generally tend to fit standard human orthodontics - they've got molars and such rather than a mouthful of wolf teeth. They possess enhanced senses. Wolves are known to be extremely tempermental.
Snakes are scaled all over. They are immune to poison and drowning, and they are poisonous themselves. Snakes are known to be very cold and few attachments to anyone besides their children.
Haven't figured out the other four yet.
One of the various kings is a dragon-king. His second son is a phoenix, and he has discovered a way to use his son's feathers to extend his own life. This, as one might imagine, is extremely painful and degrading for the son. He flees when it becomes too much, washing up on shore and finding himself with a local wolf-blood.
Father, of course, does not want his immortality to go wandering off like that and wants his boy back.
Asian Steampunk
I want a world for this guy. That is all.
[Poll #1663625]
So, I want to do request-memes for some of my original 'verses to try to get things moving in my headspace. To figure out which one I want to do first, I'm going with the tried and true method of having a poll.
Crater'verse
A planet that has been smacked by a comet in the deep past. There's a large central continent surrounded by a more-or-less ring of islands. In between the islands and the continent are the sailing cities of the Tiderunners. On the islands dwell the various kingdoms and empires of the Taiyo. The continent belongs to the Terratics, who currently have one of their kings trying to conquer the entire continent. (This happens periodically throughout their history.)
This world has X-gene-linked elemental magic. In the Taiyo, this expresses as fire; in the Tiderunners, water; and in the Terratics, earth, wood, and metal. The world is approximately late medieval/early Renaissance in terms of technology, and the flavor is definitely Eastern and First Nations. (YES, I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE THINKING.)
General belief is that daughters get their magics from their fathers, and sons get it from their mothers. Since most people marry among their own peoples, most women just get doubles of the same elemental magic gene. (This is a bit tricky among Terratics, since they have three different genes.) However, it is possible for a girl to be able to manipulate two elements. The cultural assumptions tend to lead to very few people ever realizing it.
There are air-related elemental magics that can be gained if one is sufficiently spiritually-devoted. There doesn't seem to be a restriction on what one is spiritually-devoted to; a Terratic nun of the Compassionate One can gain the Divine Breath as easily as a Taiyo high priest of the Southern Hummingbird.
As mentioned, one of the Terratic kings is trying to conquer his neighbors and is generally succeeding. His eldest son, Taizi, is an earthcrafter with a nun who returned her vows as his wife. Nima possesses the Divine Breath as well as a specialized form of earthcrafting that lets her manipulate gems. Her eldest daughter is awaiting marriage to her third betrothed in as many years, while her younger daughter spends her time with the royal tutors. Their son is between the two girls in age and attending to the last year of his officer-training.
The king's youngest son has just returned from attaining the Divine Breath as a monk dedicated to the Balance. He awaits marriage to the daughter of a volcano spirit.
Meanwhile, in the eastern Taiyo islands, a daimyo has discovered his third daughter can shape water as well as fire.
In the western Taiyo islands, there is a need for a Terratic "butterfly" (prisoner of war) to placate the Southern Hummingbird. Given the extreme distances between the islands and the continent, this is going to require enlisting the help of the Tiderunners to get there and back.
The Swan Angel
Chad, a semi-professional musician in New Orleans, finds an angel in a park one night. Said angel takes the form of a mute swan most of the time, but he saw it as it was. He wants to help it - as near as he can get out of it, it's trapped on Earth because of its muteness. It needs to produce the musics of Heaven to let the others know where it is.
Like all angels, the swan angel is frightening and dangerous, but it likes Chad, and he likes it even if it does scare him.
Eztli and the Lines
There's a National Geographic article that proposes the Nazca lines as being ritually walked to bring the necessary rains that would allow the Nazca to survive in their harsh environment. This has stuck with me for a while.
This is a secondary world fantasy that uses the lines as ritually walked paths to perform various religious functions. If one has the knowledge, one can use them for more than just ensuring the continuance of the rain and the goodwill of the deities.
Eztli suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder due to possession by a demon. She has a friend who keeps her somewhat steady, and a tattoo on her thigh to keep the demon from getting back into her head. It's not easy for a demon to possess people - the two minds don't mesh well, so the fact she got out of it with her sanity intact enough for her to still be functional makes her very interesting to the horrors in the world.
Fae New Orleans
Kim-Long Nguyen is a demi-fae Vietnamese girl living in New Orleans. Her grandfather was a stromkarl, and she inherited a touch of the music magic from him and a lot of the water magic. She's too embroiled in the local court to live a normal life, and she knows it. As a demi-fae, she can safely handle iron, which is important to fae in a modern city.
She's recently found a changeling of similar age to her who hasn't the foggiest clue of living in the human world, for all he's much more powerful than her with fae magics. The Unseelie are stirring for the first time in decades, the selkie prince has lost his meteoric iron blade, and the not-quite-fae who've also immigrated to New Orleans are difficult as hell to deal with.
Oh, and her grandfather is back in her life again.
(This one seriously does need more research, but it also needs me to play with the characters.)
The Gay Furry Porn
Another secondary-fantasy world. There are eight great spirit-bloodlines that run through the peoples of the world: dragon and phoenix, wolf and snake, badger and unicorn, and bison and crane. They produce near-humans with limited magical powers and animal traits. The spirit blood also tends to emphasize a particular negative personality trait. Spirit-bloods breed true with humans but they don't breed very much. They're definitely a minority population, rare to uncommon depending on the area but not unheard of.
The dragons and phoenixes are uniquely linked in that a phoenix is always a second child of a dragon. Not all dragons have phoenixes as second children, but the ones who do will not produce any more children after the phoenix.
Phoenixes and dragons possess wings - feathered and scaled, respectively. Dragons breathe fire and have invulnerable wings. Phoenixes live until they die of old age. Nothing else can kill them - they'll self-resurrect from death wounds and never get sick. Dragons are known to be extremely selfish, phoenixes to be extremely cruel.
Wolves posses wolf ears and wolf tail. Their teeth are much sharper than normal for humans but generally tend to fit standard human orthodontics - they've got molars and such rather than a mouthful of wolf teeth. They possess enhanced senses. Wolves are known to be extremely tempermental.
Snakes are scaled all over. They are immune to poison and drowning, and they are poisonous themselves. Snakes are known to be very cold and few attachments to anyone besides their children.
Haven't figured out the other four yet.
One of the various kings is a dragon-king. His second son is a phoenix, and he has discovered a way to use his son's feathers to extend his own life. This, as one might imagine, is extremely painful and degrading for the son. He flees when it becomes too much, washing up on shore and finding himself with a local wolf-blood.
Father, of course, does not want his immortality to go wandering off like that and wants his boy back.
Asian Steampunk
I want a world for this guy. That is all.
[Poll #1663625]
no subject
no subject
They're all really cool ideas and it's very cruel of you to make us choose only one. D: ;p
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no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject