Ari (formerly Sûl) [Discussion]

[CYMRO]

P.S. Shameless self promotion: check out the link in my sig to the magazine I published. It's got 36 full-color pages of RPG goodness, plus three ads for the CBG.

:offtopic:
The link it ain't aworkin'!

[limetom]

I'm glad to see some of those changes, though. I can't even begin to imagine how one would pronounce "Inûnærubôz".

Circumflexes indicate a long vowel.

In-uun-iiru-booz.  (Doubled vowels are long.)

[Matt Larkin (author)]

My sincere apologies for posting in the wrong thread.  Perhaps a mod could delete that for me.  And my question had already been asked by Ishmayl.

[limetom]

Don't worry about it.

[Raelifin]

The Temple of Reflection - Where are the hooks? If my PCs were wandering the desert, they'd get out of there asap when the found out the place was haunted.

I mean... I'm on vacation... yeah.

[limetom]

I'll fix that...

[beejazz]

I say hooray for Farsi!
I say ??? for the elimination of non-humans.
I say yay to crazy desert temple!

[limetom]

Farsi is an interesting language.  It is (geographically, at least) the closest thing we have to the Proto-Indo-European language today.  Plus it sounds cool.

Non-humans were never in my plan to begin with.  I added elves beacause I thought, for some reason, no one would like my setting if it didn't have any non-human races.  Now they're all gone.

Crazy desert temples are sort of like crudely disguised punjii pits.  You want to step on in (or in this case go in), but you know its a bad idea.  And then sometimes, you do it anyway.

And stuff...

[Wensleydale]

From what I've seen so far, the setting looks excellent. However, there isn't all that much of it ;)

I'd like to see more about the languages, especially.

[limetom]

Sure.  I'd like to finish updating all of the nations before I start getting into the stuff which is going to be completely new (i.e. religion and languages).

[Raelifin]

You say that the Dzimtene peninsula is covered by nothing but forest, cliff and mountains. If this is the case, how do the people there make a living? Surely you need some farmland for "subsistence agriculture."

So wait...  here we have a nation that depends on various imports and yet has no allies? Who do they trade with? I understand that a nation can trade without a political alliance, but having a dependent trade relationship with another political entity means that there's got to be some minor relationship.

Northern Ausu seems a bit dull. Are there any dangers in the mountains and forests? Any political tensions? What about interesting characters, cities, magic items? Anything?

Hmm... sounds like you've got a little more tension in this area. I imagine with the minor genocide and whatnot that there is an elitist attitude held by the Haimatians(?). Is this simply a feudal battle of long-held grudges or is there some sort of underlying religious/racial/philosophical conflict at work?

The terrain seems boring and flat. Perhaps a paragraph or in-character text would help supplement the cold readout of the region.

Why is there a King and a High Priestess as the head of state?[/quote]

[limetom]

What is the general tone of the world? What major ideas do you want to incorporate? The world as of now seems flat and lifeless, as though it has no tone.

What power level would you say Ari is?[/quote]It seems like Ari is technologically on par with Greyhawk. Is this true?[/quote]Northern Ausu:
You say that the Dzimtene peninsula is covered by nothing but forest, cliff and mountains. If this is the case, how do the people there make a living? Surely you need some farmland for "subsistence agriculture."[/quote]Northern Ausu seems a bit dull. Are there any dangers in the mountains and forests? Any political tensions? What about interesting characters, cities, magic items? Anything?[/quote]The terrain seems boring and flat. Perhaps a paragraph or in-character text would help supplement the cold readout of the region.[/quote]Why is there a King and a High Priestess as the head of state?[/quote]
It is an extreme combination of a Monarchy and a Theocracy.  The King and High Priestess are married (always an arranged marriage), and they rule jointly.

Don't know if I explained that one well enough.

That's all for now.

[Elven Doritos]

Okay... Every time I went to think up a question, it was already asked by someon else on this board. What I will, do, however, is I will pose a few techniques you might try for getting rid of that nasty writer's block:

1- Try writing some fiction set in Ari, maybe set in the Wesoi or Ausu. When you write fiction as a companion to worldbuilding, it brings up the sorts of questions and day-to-day workings of the world that you may not normally think of.

2- Try focusing your attention on a smaller aspect of the world and build up from there, rather than from the top-down. Maybe all you need is a kickstart from a far-off land.

3- Map! Your maps could use a bit of work (which  many of the board members are more than able and willing to aid with), and for me, staring at a map actually helps me come up with worldbuilding ideas.

4- Adventure! Another great way to kickstart worldbuilding work is to act as if you were writing an adventure (or, better yet, actually write one). Coming up with important villainous NPCs and more detailed locales for adventures can be another way to spark a writer's blocked setting.

Hope I was some help. :)

[limetom]

Well, this is very interesting and all that, but could you translate the french/latin/swahili bit? :P

Firstly, could a mod kindly delete Golem's post on the setting thread?  Thanks.

Secondly, its Latin, Irish, German, Latvian, Turkish, Farsi, and Proto-Indo-European.  And it would be silly if I translated it (see above).

[Wensleydale]

Oh, sorry. *slaps face*

Thankyou.

Ah yes. I KNEW there were lots of languages in there - I recognised the latin, german and... some irish, but that was about that.

I'm particularly interested in the tribal areas.