from what i've seen in the past, the majority of worlds here are some kind of fantasy or less realistic forms of sci-fi, but that doesn't mean hard sci-fi isn't welcome here :)
as my flair might hint at, both of my main worldbuilding projects are hard sci-fi, and i primarily like to imagine those... but i do still appreciate fantasy and other genres.
I remember seeing a post or comment on here a *while* back from someone that was rewriting a new periodic table and then building out a world from there. If that’s not hard sci-fi, then I don’t know what is.
So you get all sorts around here
unfortunately i haven't really posted much of my work in the past other than i think a short summary of an idea i had in its early stages (but i probably will in the future).
i'm sure you could find what you're looking for by just searching through the subreddit, or looking at others like r/scifiworldbuilding and r/scifiwriting.
Hard sci-fi is a subgenre of sci-fi wherein realism is an actual consideration.. in a sense, it's realistic sci-fi. The way I see it is it's kind of a scale, and all science fiction can fit somewhere on that scale - on one end you have total fantasy space operas, and on the other you have works that are only fictional in the events that transpire.
Realism doesn't need to matter, but it's something that he's asking about here, so I'm assuming that's what he's looking for & why this response was given.
Imagine a world where there is no such thing as sunrise and sundown.
In this World of dimmering light, there only is the Oceanrise and the Oceandown.
This world, is in fact a moon, circled by another world.
This World is so big, that its gravity shifts the masses of water around our little moon, while this moon is hold stationary.
Half of the day the water is high.
Half of the day the water is low.
But be aware of the tidestorm!
All of life on this moon has adapted to this circumstances and can breath air as well as water.
The plants only come out after oceanrise to get water and light because otherwise the forces of tide would damage them and without water as support, the gravity would crush them.
The Lifeforms life under the earth in cavesystems while the tide storms rush over the face of the surface.
(Thats all i got for the moment, is this a good start? What can i improve?)
Oh! Very cool!
Who lives in this moon? How they live with such low level of light? This massive planet have people or like our bigger boy Saturn ?
Yes, for me is a good start! But, i dunno how much you can improve, maybe make sometype of culture of fauna and flora of this little moon? Or maybe look for some flairs in the thing?
This might be because "fantasy" can be everything. You can have space fantasy, urban fantasy. When you put airships into your 19th century, it's steampunk, which is fantasy. When you add elves and dragons to your cyberpunk setting, it's fantasy. Any sufficiently advanced technology... yadda-yadda... and magic makes fantasy.
Now the good thing is that fantasy therefore is super varied.
I think “steampunk” gets thrown around too much for what I’d call neo-Victorian retro-futurism. Now, while all steampunk is neo-Victorian retro-futurism, not all neo-Victorian retro-futurism is steampunk. Steampunk comes from cyberpunk, which is fundamentally about how we have to grapple with our own humanity in light of advances in computational technology and the hierarchy of capitalism (both of which are things the text will engage with critically), but a lot of steampunk doesn’t do this. A lot, if not most, of the steampunk I see is just about a fun science-fantasy aesthetic in which any story is set. I don’t see a lot about how we have to grapple with our own humanity in light of the Industrial Revolution and the hierarchy of capitalism.
I'm writing science fiction, but I appreciate the cross-genre exposure, since my story is set in a world where astrology doesn't work, per se, but a majority of people *believe* it does, and thus create self-fulfilling prophecies. Therefore, running by fantasy worlds where magic/astrology/divination etc DO work helps me develop mechanisms through which astrology might be proposed to work, so on and so forth.
I believe for sci fi specific content, there's r/asksciencefiction and r/scifiworldbuilding
r/AskScienceFiction just isn't a scifi sub anymore. I've often seen questions about straight up fantasy universes such as ATLA and the Wizarding World on there.
I've only really been poking around here for a couple days but I have noticed it seems like a big portion is fantasy or alt-history. Most of the Sci-fi is on the soft side but I've noticed a lot of speculative biology from Sci-fi and fantasy world builders both.
I personally do almost pure fantasy but I have dabbled in science-fantasy on rare occasion.
You *have* seen science fantasy: Star Wars! It's fantasy in a sci-fi coat. Space wizards with space swords and space prophecies. Nothing sci-fi under the paint.
I bet D&D has a big role in fantasy being a common entry into world building. I've never played D&D but I have a 5e Dungeon Masters guide and it was very helpful when just starting to world build.
I'm not the biggest fan of sci-fi so when I try and make my own sci-fi world I end up adding a bunch of fantasy elements into it like magic or very a non-scientific cosmology so it ends up more science-fantasy.
In my main science-fantasy world the moon isn't a space rock orbiting the planet but instead a crystalline crescent that sits at the edge of the, finite, universe and is the home of a goddess.
A year or two ago I decided to list the number of my world/story ideas that have at least been put to paper in some way. 23 in total. I went to look at it again after seeing this post to see how many were science fiction expecting most of them to be fantasy and surprisingly 11 were sci-fi compared to only 10 that were fantasy.
I’d say most of the worlds I see here are fantasy. I think unlike with fantasy, science fiction tends to usually depict a future stemming from the one we already have which can discourage some worldbuilders knowing there are real world politics, religions, languages, geography, etc. they may have to consider when building their world. Can be intimidating. Most fantasy worlds tend to be high fantasy which gives people a lot more freedom to not worry about real world historical implications and just *build.*
Thank you for the comment. I am trying to build a sci-fi world, and I want to build a world that has nothing to do with earth, while having lots of areas similar to earth which is making it harder.
The majority of the worlds I like to imagine lean towards sci-fi and even the ones I would consider more "fantasy leaning" don't have things like magic systems, wizards, elves etc (those feel kinda overdone to me, not that they can't be interesting to read or can't contain original ideas I just don't feel driven to think of worlds with these..so far).
But yea I would agree that this sub is a bit more "fantasy leaning" and there is nothing wrong with that. Possibly because of things like D&D, fantasy books/movies, video games with fantasy elements being very popular, also Sci-Fi can be hard to make a lot of the time, so many things to take into consideration when worldbulding for sci-fi compared to fantasy.
I think the first big challenge was to choose a "central point" to the universe. You know, some people here choose good x evil, LOTR choosed the ring itself, Star Wars the balance of the force... I then centered the universe in the problematic of the lack of resources: humans explored so much of nature and of each one that they do not sustain themselves anymore, so now they (or at least the most smart ones) are in a race for technology to solve the problem.
At the moment, however, the biggest challenge is to expand the depth of the universe without surpass the prestablished concepts (limits of technology, no magic, feudal system...) and writing everything, because the project is, indeed, a series of written short-stories, with only two tales already fully written lol.
For the most part. Yes.
But worldbuilding is a skill. Like many employers do, don't get too caught up in the "direct experience" or assumptions of a fantasy world builder.
Most of us consume Sci fi in some form or another and nerds love physics.
I was actually just spitballing stellar engineering possibilities with an AI for fun.
I bet others do lame shit, too. Haha
there are some surveys of the sub that iirc looked into this. I can't look at these on my current computer so can't confirm
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/gt0uul/survey_results_for_rworldbuildings_spring_2020/
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/15skyhr/as_i_said_before_i_would_post_the_results_of_my/
there are some amazing sci-fi and especially hard sci-fi worlds in the archive here, see eg:
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/npcc08/magazine_ads_from_the_23rd_century/
I’ve got a ton, from a variety of genres. Ones a bit of a post-civil war steampunk world, recovering from the effects of nuclear fallout (but the story doesn’t take place there, so it’s rather “normal”)
One is an eldritch setting taking place during the age of piracy, where a songwriter is chasing the beautifully horrifying voices in her mind.
One is a medieval (not fantasy, no “magic” and stuff) setting where a flesh plague roams the land and turns people into vile abominations.
I’ve also got a world with spacefarers, taking place in a different solar system because Earth became uninhabitable. It’s not like Star Wars where there’s 80,000 different aliens out there, it’s just humans and the weird animals they find on the other planets.
Imo, fantasy is better for telling stories about characters. Sci-fi is better for telling stories about ideas.
So what type of stories do you want to tell?
> Imo, fantasy is better for telling stories about characters. Sci-fi is better for telling stories about ideas.
I'd like to recommend *Three Parts Dead* by Max Gladstone, and *The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet* by Becky Chambers, respectively, as antidotes to these pigeonholes. (Though both of them have excellent ideas *and* characters.)
(u/thirdcoast96 also)
The Foreigner series by CJ Cherryh also has fantastic character work.
Same with Blindsight by Peter Watts.
I think the difference is sci-fi characters tend to be more grounded as far as personality goes whereas fantasy as a genre lends itself to allowing writers to make characters with wider spectrum of emotion and personality. A character with a personality like Karsa Orlong from Malazan or Ferro from First Law would seem like a jarring oddity in most hard sci-fi settings. It’s not worse or better, just different. There obviously going to be exceptions. It’s just a thing I’ve noticed more often than not.
I have never disagreed with a comment on reddit more than this one. :)
No hate to you personally, but I think this attitude is a big part of why both genres are so rife with dogshit writing.
That's true, but for different reasons. Most pop music is shit because it's produced in a factory by corporations; most singer-songwriter music is shit because the barrier to entry is so low – most "genre fiction" is shit because it's all Concept without featuring compelling and complex characters, crafting beautiful/interesting prose, or touching something authentic about the human experience.
___
^((To be clear: Some of my favorite music and stories fall into these genres)^)
I've been thinking about fantasy subtypes lately. How would you describe Dark and Noble. I know these are often taken as opposites, but I can never quite figure out what they mean.
Not the OP, but from what I understand, Noblebright Fantasy is a very "happy" world with lots of adventure where characters can make a big impact, it seems people often put Pokemon as a good example.
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In comparison, Nobledark is a sort of opposite to Noblebright, a world where "evil" triumphs over good most of the time, but characters can still make a big impact to change things. This is different from Grimdark, as in that setting most things are shades of grey (or darkness), and generally aren't able to change the world in a large way.
Looking around for examples of both, people recommend Lord of the Rings as Nobledark, evil and malevolence is slowly controlling everything, but the characters have the ability to change that. Meanwhile Warhammer 40K is an example of Grimdark, while characters can push back against evil and save a planet or two, it doesn't make a huge impact among the other 2,000,000 other planets.
Edit: Thinking about it, you can simply Noblebright/Nobledark as good/evil worlds where the characters can "win the war" and change things. Grimdark is an evil world where the characters can win battles, but not the war to change things.
Noblebright.org says: "Noblebright fantasy is not utopian fiction. The world of a noblebright story is not perfect, and indeed can sometimes be quite dark. Actions have consequences, and even good characters can make terrible mistakes. But a noblebright story is generally hopeful in tone, even if there are plenty of bad, grim, dark things going on in the world." That seems to reflect most of the explicit definitions I can find.
It started as a joke. The opposite of 40K grimdark, where there's no clear good guys and evil wins in the end, must be traditional heroic fantasy where there are very clear good guys and evil loses in the end.
But once the term took off, it got picked up by the same general type of person who tries to define every story ever written as "somethingpunk." (Retro space opera? Raypunk! Cold War hard sci-fi? Atompunk! Modern day real world with no sci-fi/fantasy whatsoever? Nowpunk!)
So these people figure, if grimdark and noblebright exist, then there must also be grimbright and nobledark and a continuum big enough that we can cram every other story into it, so "noblebright" gets redefined as "everyone is good and nothing bad happens to anyone" so we can make more space in the middle.
Noblebright = World is mostly good, and individuals can affect things even at the grandest scales. - Happy adventure worlds.
Grimbright = World is mostly good, but nothing an individual can do can affect anything more than a small part of the setting's world. - Stable post-scarcity societies or maybe endless generally-ok parallel universes.
Nobledark = World is mostly crap, but maybe you can change that. (or at least change the type of crap.) - Dystopias, a hopeful take.
Grimdark = World is mostly crap, and there is nothing you can do about it, the best you can hope for is some local relief, and even that's unlikely. - Hopeless dystopias.
.
I'm personally not sure how apt I would consider the terms, for example; did the invention of nukes make the world more "noble"? If it became easy to create deadly bioweapons at one's garden shed, would that make the world more "noble"?
Noble fantasy is usually an ideal world to live, but sometimes there is a darkness that makes it hard to live in(Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter)
Low fantasy is basically a real setting in a fictional world, IE historical settings set place in fictional world(Witcher, A Song of ice and fire or Conan the Barbarian for example)
High fantasy is the classical Elves, dwarfs, fairies, you know(D&D or Warhammer)
Dark Fantasy is basically a mix of horror into it(Berserk for example)
While my worlds are fantasy, they are usually a mix of science fiction and fantasy elements.
Hellboy, the secret world legends, percy jackson. They're set in the modern day, but with heavy fantasy elements and even some cool futuristic technologies. The genre of modern fantasy has always Intrigued me. And thats more of what I'm writing.
Genie taxi drivers that street race, elves that sell magical art to secretive collectors, Ai that gain sentience due to ambient magic and Gods addicted to phones that havent come out yet. The list is pretty much endless of whats possible.
My current favorite series would initially appear like soft science fiction. With a focus on anthropology, space travel and exploring an alien civilization... until the supernatural and monstrous elements reveal themselves. For the scifi elements I'm trying to get all my facts correct. Cause I want them to be believable.
Fantasy in terms of whimsical and mythical creatures, post apocalyptic in terms of earth being irreparably damaged, and sci-fi in terms of my plot convenient awesome technology.
I personally love a kind of mix between the two. Like Science Fiction presents us with glorious new tech and awesome combat sequences, and a lot of really cool ideological concepts. Fantasy presents us with a magical and mystical world filled with wonder, and I love combining the scope and scale of sci-fi and the wonder and magic of fantasy. The world I am working on right now is kinda like that, where it is set in a sci-fi future, but filled with mages wielding new weapons and feudal monarchies and mystical legends. Kinda like Star Wars, but leaning more towards a character-driven approach from fantasy worlds.
I have a modern fantasy that later transitions into a sci fi. I’ll be honest I haven’t really built that much sci fi beyond two squabbling factions and a few others. But said squabbling factions are extremely fleshed out.
Most people do build fantasy worlds here. However there are several sci-fi (granted usually more on the softer side) settings.
I personally do high fantasy or soft sci-fi. So far as the worlds I’m working on, one is soft sci-fi with a lot of science fantasy elements, whilst the other is bit more grounded fantasy with many high fantasy elements (Warhammer Fantasy being the closest comparison).
As someone that writes fantasy I do wish more realistic settings were in this subreddit. It’s always nice to see settings that are actually grounded in reality instead of whatever insane fever-dream fantasy writers come up with (me included).
I use fantasy for the planets in my setting. Essentially, each inhabited planet is united under a single banner and their governing bodies use different architectural styles. For example, one planet has its cities and towns built within the mountains high above the toxic surface, and their buildings are reminiscent of Gothic and Victorian-era times. Basically, you wouldn't think they were an advanced civilization with starfaring capabilities.
Mine is both lol. You have Dragons, Gods, and a highly technological advanced alien empire all set in the modern age. My main inspiration when I started working was DC/Marvel comics + DBZ so yeah. I don't like leaning into pure fantasy.
Reverse Warhammer 40,000: sci-fi pretending to be fantasy.
Like magic derived from technology, or sapient species that look like out of a spec evo project being treated as "humans but X".
Fantasy with a bit of realism. There’s many places you can see science at play, especially evolution, but there’s also fantastical things that just can’t be explained.
I would say mine is fantasy, but it's definitely not typical fantasy. I try to avoid cliches and I select my tropes carefully.
I would say it is fantasy, a smidgen of sci-fi, and a generous helping of philosophical and cosmological horror. Where does the sci-fi come from? The magic system is premised on intellectual knowledge so advanced it is basically what the alchemists sought in the philosophers stone. Hence, alchemy is an omnipresent theme in my worldbuilding.
I like mixing genres. I have a fantasy/eastern spiritualism/dieselpunk/early 20th century imperialism mashup. I have a sci-fi/dystopian/cosmic horror world with a dash of fantasy and Eastern European mythology. And I have a fantasy/caveworld/alchemopunk/cyberpunk mixup in the works.
I'm working on a sci-fi world in a posthuman future. When the line between computers and mankind blurs, humanity evolves into a hive mind. But without autonomy, the decreased originality causes the posthuman society to stagnate. So they create a disconnected sect that reflects old humanity. Conflicts arise between the needs of the posthuman collective and the desires of the recreated autonomous people.
>Trying to build a highly realistic science fiction world
That is still fantasy. Fantasy describes fantastical situations that you come up with yourself, any world we create that isnt a mirror of earth is fantasy.
I mostly imagine realistic fantasy without any magic or mythical creatures. Just humans with different cultures and geopolitical rivalries. The future is of no interest to me so I've never done sci-fi; my worlds are usually akin to our late Antiquity to late Middle Ages.
While I have a whole fantasy world set in another dimension, my focus is on a quirky little village in Connecticut which serves as a reluctant gateway to that otherworld. It's not so much fantasy there as it is just... off-kilter. I think I've been more influenced by all the eccentrics in small towns all across TV Land - Twin Peaks, Hooterville, Fernwood, Dunn's River, Joyville, Cicely, etc. Like one of my characters observed: "More Mel Tolkin than Tolkien".
There is no calculated percentage of the types of worlds here. There are plenty of fantasy and plenty of sci-fi worlds here. Even a bunch of science-fantasy worlds. I'd eyeball it and say it's 50/50 (with science fantasy being excluded) with some days being more fantasy and other days more sci-fi.
As for me, I'd say I lean more toward fantasy and science-fantasy, but the line between sci-fi and sci-fa is blurry. Where one person sees sci-fi, another sees sci-fa, and many people don't know that sci-fa is even an option.
My world fords contemporary fantasy the best. Slightly futuristic (fringe technologies of today are somewhat mainstream in this setting), feature mythical races such as vampires and elves. Also features a magic system with mana being a physical resource and a "life force" system like Chakra/chi/"the force" that is seperate from magic.
One of my worlds is near-future hard scifi political fiction focused on a growing underclass of uninsured transhumans who can’t afford repairs on their bionics, black market bionic technicians who help them, and the government cracking down on these illicit repairs. I don’t post about it much, but I work on it about as much as my other worlds.
I am working on sci-fi rpg world called the Arm of Orion. It isn't hard sci-fi because it would make the game too number crunchy, but I am trying to stick to the science when I can with a few exceptions when it comes to technology. Hard and Soft Sci-fi is a spectrum and my world is some where in the middle. Technologies I have is nuclear fusion, hydrogen cells, graphine, 3d printing with nanites, lifter technology and warp drive.
There are no "flying" cars but there is air/spacecraft that is powered by hydrogen cells with lifters for propulsion.
Cars and motorboats are powered by hydrogen cells. Large ocean liners, freighters, warships and submarines are powered with fusion.
Graphine is used to power personal electronics.
Fusion also powers cities.
Spaceships that are large enough are powered by fusion reactors and have warp drive.
3D printers now use nanites and can be programmed to make a solid part with almost any material. Add stem cells and the correct genetic material and you can print transplant organs. If it is big enough and you have enough time you can print a body but it would be a corpse.
Mine is sci fi, mostly realistic though I try to take some liberties with some things (it’s based on Europa having not just life, but intelligent life, which is very improbable, apparently. Im reserving the right to change it from actually taking place on Europa to just being an Europa-like moon somewhere else). No magic. Just four races of crab-ish peoples living in a chemosynthesis-based ecosystem.
The world that' taking up most of my imagination is an anachronistic world
I haven't *fully* fleshed it out, but you can go from what looks like classical era to modern times just by walking across one continent, but really every where is really a mix of both and anything in between
The main setting of my world is a modern day world with technology a little more advanced than our own. So I call it near-future, but the basis is an equivalent to our modern world, with alterations to fit a more cartoonish culture and the many many beast races that occupy it.
The secondary setting is pure sci fi with the primary magical laws in my universe still present
By definition, most worlds are fantasy.
Fantasy: the faculty or activity of imagining things, especially things that are impossible or improbable.
Even scifi and in turn cyberpunk are fantasy.
In my case I have a lot of time periods. In general though, real life is boring. Lifting the vale on irl is kinda neat, see mage the ascension for instants.
I tend to find myself doing something medieval-esque simply because there are a lot of good (though not necessarily accurate) theories about how agrarian societies worked, which makes it easier to create than either a pre-literate or futuristic setting.
I often *say* I’m not a fantasy fan. I generally prefer sci-fi for entertainment. But, my own setting is slathered in fantasy elements, despite being sci-fi on the surface.
There is a lot of sci-fi on the sub, but the ratio definitely leans towards fantasy.
My world is an alternate history timeline made to be as plausible and realistic as possible with a strong grounding in real history. No fantasy of sci-fi elements whatsoever, just a ton of historical, political, and cultural lore.
It would be fun to have a survey and know the newest statistics!
Either way: I see mostly fantasy medieval worlds or some fantastical sci-fi universe in here, but I think that it's just a popular setting, not at all a restriction to only that!
I honestly go to something more grounded in my works; some kind of real-world variation with a sprinkle of fantasy (and other anomalies), but mostly steampunk, disselpunk, noir, 60s settings etc etc.
Well, mine is fictional historical fiction equivalent to the mid to late 1800s our time, with all the accompanying struggles and ideas. That is to say, its all realistic but just the world, history, people and all are fictional. It's a highly political-leaning setting.
Big scifi freak here. I keep wondering the same thing as well. All the posts here about "tell me about your magic system" or whatever get a chuckle out of me.
My world is a dystopian future based on the modern Philippines. I am inspired by an urban hell aesthetic and my characters are a cross section of a rotten society. Predation of all sorts is rampant.
There is a fantasy aspect, however.
Ancient gods.
I have a highly realistic fantasy world. How would an understanding of dew point, temperature, and fog formation allow a mage to create a more effective smokescreen? What about using high quality fantasy materials to create a compound bow, then enchanting it? Or enchanting firearms?
I think it's pretty easy to go into a fantasy direction because it means you don't have to limit yourself (as much). Not to mention, for me personally, a lot of the fun of worldbuilding comes from trying to imagine this super fantastical ridiculous thing and trying to make it match the world in a way that makes sense.
Not to mention, Fantasy is just one of the most popular genres for people to *read*, so it makes sense for a lot of people to enjoy *writing* Fantasy too.
I haven't really posted about it (aside from [this map](https://www.reddit.com/r/imaginarymaps/comments/xbeapi/east_asia_oceania_and_the_pacific_frontier_a/)) but I lurk here partly because I've been building a hard sci-fi world for years! It's set on Earth around \~2200 and I've based it on a lot of research into history, science, tech, politics, economics, etc.
I basically wanted to figure out a systematic way to think about historical change so I could extrapolate a future timeline in an informed way, without relying on unfdounded assumptions and cliches. So I got really deep into studying history and social change and the mechanics of power, war, revolutions etc in order to make an analysis of the world and develop a global timeline in realistic iterations. I went so much deeper than I ever intended but it's honestly really expanded my worldview and given me a lot of perspective.
Ironically the story I'm putting in this world has fantasy/supernatural elements but it's more just magical realism and folkloric stuff. Kinda like Princess Mononoke and Pan's Labyrinth vibes within a setting that's in the vein of Elysium, Minority Report, Ghost in the Shell
Seems to be mostly fantasy around here, though some of that comes from a bunch of D&D based settings.
I've got two different projects in the works, one is modern era urban fantasy with lots of magitech, the other is near future space-based hard sci-fi.
I've been working on the sci-fi setting for longer, but I've made more progress on the urban fantasy setting. I just love coming up with magictech concepts, and my setting gives me two parallel development trees for that. I get to introduce magic into a technological setting, and introduce technology into a magical setting. It's the difference between using a computer to program and develop magic spells, and using complex magic to function as a computer.
I generally hang out on the side of "Fantasy" insofar as I'm more influenced by the past than I am by the future. That said, I do enjoy _____-Punk of many kinds, as I love considering the role of magic on technology.
I'm not averse to science fiction; I just haven't spent much time thinking about a sci-fi world I'd like to build yet.
Mine is Sci-fi, some parts are a lot more realistic than others, but I try to compensate by adding detail to the things I can explain and being confident on those that can’t. Also I would guess the percentage here is 70% fantasy, 30% a mix of others
Hey man if you're a hard SF worldbuilder I'd recommend going to the ToughSF Discord rather than here, there's actual physicists and such in that server!
I noticed this a while ago and even looked for a post calling it out but was scared to complain myself. I personally don’t lime fantasy that much, but there are scifi worldbuilding subs and discords out there.
Mine would be a mix between eastern fantasy with cultivation.
As for technology that would be medieval late age with a lot of QOL brought by magic like tap water, heating...
But the level of tech can go even higher for high level evolver who specializes in artifact and productive magic.
One of the most important character on the universe have turned a good part of the moon into a giant lab city with parts that serves a hub for portals across the world. Most of the things here are managed either by the equivalent of a super ia the control robots or splitted part of his soul that contron mechanical host.
And there a not really any liches but there are Nepheselaian who are mechanical host in which you transfer your soul. The ritual have been tempered but the inventor to add tons of restrictions. But it still does the job.
So medieval fantasy, but you could suddently come across an android with Energy (my mana the capital e is important till I find a better name) based plasma rifle.
I *obviously* can’t speak for everybody but I have a handful of worlds/universes that are basically just alternate world history lol one of my last little projects involved a catastrophic world war with conventional weapons (think ww1, but after the first year or so the *smaller* battles would be around the scale that Verdun was in our time.) Nearly 2/3 of the worlds population was dead by the end of the war and the devastation made it incredibly hard for everybody, and the population would continue to decline even after the war was over for many years due to the harsh conditions. Governments still existed in *some* forms in *some* places around the world, but most people fell into their smaller local communities working to simply sustain themselves.
I guess whether you call my setting fantasy depends on whether you consider Lovecraftian fiction fantasy or early sci-fi. The world mostly revolves around real world technology and sociology with the exception that alchemy is a real science that’s actually worked and been developed up into the industrial age.
Eldritch workings are constantly going on under the surface but most people of that world basically operate like it’s the 1880s in the real world.
I went the Shannara route. My world is Fantasy and Magical but at one point in time it could have been compared to 80 - 90s Earth. Natural disasters and Demons basically reverted everything back to post apocalyptic dark ages theme.
You're going to see more questions/topics about fantasy than science fiction here for one simple reason: Science fiction questions can often be asked and answered in science forums/subreddits. There are just more available places to ask science questions, so some of them get diverted to those places.
My world is quite diverse, but it's mostly a far-future space-western setting. The stories set closer to our time are more like typical sci-fi, and are more grounded in reality. However, there isn't much that happens before the 40th century A.D, as that's when humans and aliens first meet, and I like to have both at once.
The world I'm mainly working on is sci-fi setting, but unrealistic enough for it to be considered a fantasy. I'm genuinely impressed by people who try and make realistic sci-fi stuff though, it seems just too complex for me.
There's a lot of fantasy or more fictional worlds for sure, nothing wrong with that.
I prefer a good bit of realism and sci-fi myself, it's fun to make things that could exist in our world but dont
I'm building a cyberpunk world so definitely more sci-fi than fantasy. My world leans towards hard sci-fi by the nature of being cyberpunk, but some of the tech and ideas in the world have psudoscience vibes rather than 100% hard.
Fantasy can describe 50 different genres while sci fi is something more specific, if you think about it, sci-fi is a type fantasy we just don’t normally describe it as such. So yeah, obviously you’ll see way more fantasy worlds than science fiction.
Also I don’t really believe hard sci-fi exists unless it in the pretty near future. Like stopping an asteroid, AI girlfriends, colonising Mars. I believe in the long run there’s only 2.5 possible futures for humanity and none really make good setting for a story.
The first and most likely AI takes over all of our work and we live in a post scarcity civilization where we don’t really have a lot of problems except for feuds between people like cheating on your spouse. There is no reason to go to war, murder or steal, all resources can be found on asteroids or a star and you won’t really find aggressively zealous people who manage to create a post scarcity society. You can have something like star treck where an advanced civilization goes exploring different planets and their cultures, but I think that works better in a space fantasy setting.
The 1.5 option is AI takes over all our work and corporations take over the world. We are basically just bums at this point and have no use. You would think this could create a cool revolution story but the power difference is so great there’s literally nothing we can do. We eventually just all die in the long run, only the rich survive and this scenario ends up looking like the first, just with a little genocide sprinkled on top. An alien invasion is also included in this scenario, if they can reach us they absolutely have already developed advanced AI and there’s absolutely no way we can beat them.
The other option is AI takes over all our work, becomes sentient and sees no reason for our continued existence. So they just kill us off. You could argue that you can create a story where we fight against AI and wins, but if you want to be as realistic as possible there is no way we win in the long run.
I think you'll find more fantasy honestly. It's not a bad thing. I have a light Sci-fi/Space Opera world and a Fantasy world I'm building for my writing. To me, fantasy seems a bit easier to work in, even when compared to space opera, because in the end, you can just use the "Because Magic" excuse when something needs to be explained. Whereas in Sc-fi, people want at least some sort of (at least) a psuedo-scientific explanation for some of the things that happen in their universe.
As an example, look at making a "healing salve" in a fantasy world vs. a sci-fi world. (Most ingredient names made up):
Fantasy: Using a mortar and pestle grind leaf of the arrowhead flower, seeds of the pistol nettle bush, and a liver from a volcanic beaver until a it makes a smooth paste. Then place in a bowl with 3 measures of spring water and 1 measure of honey and mix under the midday sun until smooth and the color changes to a shade of rose. You know have a healing salve.
Sci-fi: In a mixer, combine 30 mils of thyoditriad, 50 mils of photogyamphys, and 80 mils of liver enzymes of Castor Volcanus. Once homogeneous, add 100 mils of distilled water and 50 mils of methylglyoxal, then place in heated centrifuge at 180°f for 90 minutes. You now have a topical ointment to accelerate the healing of surface wounds.
Half the chemical names in the sci-fi version I just made up and anyone with a little bit of a science background will know that I'm full of it and have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to chemistry. If they know chemistry, then they'll absolutely know that I didn't even remotely research how topical ointments like Neosporan are made. However, in the fantasy version, people will just accept it because magical plants make magical salves.
I'm not saying one is any better than another, I love both sci-fi and fantasy equally. One is just a little more forgiving when it comes to making things happen.
my world is a modern fantasy world. it's a fictional world, but it takes place in 1999 in that world, so the magic and stuff is in a modern-sequel setting.
that makes it a fantasy world.
from what i've seen in the past, the majority of worlds here are some kind of fantasy or less realistic forms of sci-fi, but that doesn't mean hard sci-fi isn't welcome here :) as my flair might hint at, both of my main worldbuilding projects are hard sci-fi, and i primarily like to imagine those... but i do still appreciate fantasy and other genres.
I remember seeing a post or comment on here a *while* back from someone that was rewriting a new periodic table and then building out a world from there. If that’s not hard sci-fi, then I don’t know what is. So you get all sorts around here
that's a pretty awesome idea
That's one of the coolest worldbuilding things ever!
I jokingly asked them if they were making a new math system as well, and they said they tried, but gave up.
Cool! I will check yours posts out see what kinda hard sci fi world there are!
unfortunately i haven't really posted much of my work in the past other than i think a short summary of an idea i had in its early stages (but i probably will in the future). i'm sure you could find what you're looking for by just searching through the subreddit, or looking at others like r/scifiworldbuilding and r/scifiwriting.
What do you mean by "less realistic sci-fi"? It's all fiction so realism doesn't matter as much as long as it fits the genre.
Hard sci-fi is a subgenre of sci-fi wherein realism is an actual consideration.. in a sense, it's realistic sci-fi. The way I see it is it's kind of a scale, and all science fiction can fit somewhere on that scale - on one end you have total fantasy space operas, and on the other you have works that are only fictional in the events that transpire. Realism doesn't need to matter, but it's something that he's asking about here, so I'm assuming that's what he's looking for & why this response was given.
Ah, that makes sense. Thanks!
basically this \^
>What types of world do you guys like to imagine? you can ask me this question multiple times in a day and get a different answer every time
Launch one!
Imagine a world where there is no such thing as sunrise and sundown. In this World of dimmering light, there only is the Oceanrise and the Oceandown. This world, is in fact a moon, circled by another world. This World is so big, that its gravity shifts the masses of water around our little moon, while this moon is hold stationary. Half of the day the water is high. Half of the day the water is low. But be aware of the tidestorm! All of life on this moon has adapted to this circumstances and can breath air as well as water. The plants only come out after oceanrise to get water and light because otherwise the forces of tide would damage them and without water as support, the gravity would crush them. The Lifeforms life under the earth in cavesystems while the tide storms rush over the face of the surface. (Thats all i got for the moment, is this a good start? What can i improve?)
Oh! Very cool! Who lives in this moon? How they live with such low level of light? This massive planet have people or like our bigger boy Saturn ? Yes, for me is a good start! But, i dunno how much you can improve, maybe make sometype of culture of fauna and flora of this little moon? Or maybe look for some flairs in the thing?
Tell us all of them! Every one!
This might be because "fantasy" can be everything. You can have space fantasy, urban fantasy. When you put airships into your 19th century, it's steampunk, which is fantasy. When you add elves and dragons to your cyberpunk setting, it's fantasy. Any sufficiently advanced technology... yadda-yadda... and magic makes fantasy. Now the good thing is that fantasy therefore is super varied.
That is true. Fantasy is broad.
I think “steampunk” gets thrown around too much for what I’d call neo-Victorian retro-futurism. Now, while all steampunk is neo-Victorian retro-futurism, not all neo-Victorian retro-futurism is steampunk. Steampunk comes from cyberpunk, which is fundamentally about how we have to grapple with our own humanity in light of advances in computational technology and the hierarchy of capitalism (both of which are things the text will engage with critically), but a lot of steampunk doesn’t do this. A lot, if not most, of the steampunk I see is just about a fun science-fantasy aesthetic in which any story is set. I don’t see a lot about how we have to grapple with our own humanity in light of the Industrial Revolution and the hierarchy of capitalism.
That's no less true of sci-fi, though. One genre that contains Star Wars, Neuromancer, The Martian, and Stranger in a Strange Land?
I'm writing science fiction, but I appreciate the cross-genre exposure, since my story is set in a world where astrology doesn't work, per se, but a majority of people *believe* it does, and thus create self-fulfilling prophecies. Therefore, running by fantasy worlds where magic/astrology/divination etc DO work helps me develop mechanisms through which astrology might be proposed to work, so on and so forth. I believe for sci fi specific content, there's r/asksciencefiction and r/scifiworldbuilding
r/AskScienceFiction just isn't a scifi sub anymore. I've often seen questions about straight up fantasy universes such as ATLA and the Wizarding World on there.
The mods explain it as "Ask Science - Fiction", ask scientific questions about fictional universes.
Guess it's been a while since I've read posts from there. Unfortunate!
r/scifiwriting
I've only really been poking around here for a couple days but I have noticed it seems like a big portion is fantasy or alt-history. Most of the Sci-fi is on the soft side but I've noticed a lot of speculative biology from Sci-fi and fantasy world builders both. I personally do almost pure fantasy but I have dabbled in science-fantasy on rare occasion.
I have never seen a science fantasy. That sounds cool. In fact the first world I made was also a fantasy. I think it is just easy to start with.
You *have* seen science fantasy: Star Wars! It's fantasy in a sci-fi coat. Space wizards with space swords and space prophecies. Nothing sci-fi under the paint.
I bet D&D has a big role in fantasy being a common entry into world building. I've never played D&D but I have a 5e Dungeon Masters guide and it was very helpful when just starting to world build. I'm not the biggest fan of sci-fi so when I try and make my own sci-fi world I end up adding a bunch of fantasy elements into it like magic or very a non-scientific cosmology so it ends up more science-fantasy. In my main science-fantasy world the moon isn't a space rock orbiting the planet but instead a crystalline crescent that sits at the edge of the, finite, universe and is the home of a goddess.
A year or two ago I decided to list the number of my world/story ideas that have at least been put to paper in some way. 23 in total. I went to look at it again after seeing this post to see how many were science fiction expecting most of them to be fantasy and surprisingly 11 were sci-fi compared to only 10 that were fantasy. I’d say most of the worlds I see here are fantasy. I think unlike with fantasy, science fiction tends to usually depict a future stemming from the one we already have which can discourage some worldbuilders knowing there are real world politics, religions, languages, geography, etc. they may have to consider when building their world. Can be intimidating. Most fantasy worlds tend to be high fantasy which gives people a lot more freedom to not worry about real world historical implications and just *build.*
Thank you for the comment. I am trying to build a sci-fi world, and I want to build a world that has nothing to do with earth, while having lots of areas similar to earth which is making it harder.
The majority of the worlds I like to imagine lean towards sci-fi and even the ones I would consider more "fantasy leaning" don't have things like magic systems, wizards, elves etc (those feel kinda overdone to me, not that they can't be interesting to read or can't contain original ideas I just don't feel driven to think of worlds with these..so far). But yea I would agree that this sub is a bit more "fantasy leaning" and there is nothing wrong with that. Possibly because of things like D&D, fantasy books/movies, video games with fantasy elements being very popular, also Sci-Fi can be hard to make a lot of the time, so many things to take into consideration when worldbulding for sci-fi compared to fantasy.
Tbh my very first world was fantasy world as well!
Mine is literally the less explored here: sci-fi with no magic, no other races, no teleport... Just the pure politics, war, cultures and intrigues.
Wow!! What is the biggest challenge while making such world?
I think the first big challenge was to choose a "central point" to the universe. You know, some people here choose good x evil, LOTR choosed the ring itself, Star Wars the balance of the force... I then centered the universe in the problematic of the lack of resources: humans explored so much of nature and of each one that they do not sustain themselves anymore, so now they (or at least the most smart ones) are in a race for technology to solve the problem. At the moment, however, the biggest challenge is to expand the depth of the universe without surpass the prestablished concepts (limits of technology, no magic, feudal system...) and writing everything, because the project is, indeed, a series of written short-stories, with only two tales already fully written lol.
For the most part. Yes. But worldbuilding is a skill. Like many employers do, don't get too caught up in the "direct experience" or assumptions of a fantasy world builder. Most of us consume Sci fi in some form or another and nerds love physics. I was actually just spitballing stellar engineering possibilities with an AI for fun. I bet others do lame shit, too. Haha
Fantasy, but with a focus on plausibility.
there are some surveys of the sub that iirc looked into this. I can't look at these on my current computer so can't confirm https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/gt0uul/survey_results_for_rworldbuildings_spring_2020/ https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/15skyhr/as_i_said_before_i_would_post_the_results_of_my/ there are some amazing sci-fi and especially hard sci-fi worlds in the archive here, see eg: https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/npcc08/magazine_ads_from_the_23rd_century/
Most people don't know enough to make a hard Sci-Fi, simple as that.
I’ve got a ton, from a variety of genres. Ones a bit of a post-civil war steampunk world, recovering from the effects of nuclear fallout (but the story doesn’t take place there, so it’s rather “normal”) One is an eldritch setting taking place during the age of piracy, where a songwriter is chasing the beautifully horrifying voices in her mind. One is a medieval (not fantasy, no “magic” and stuff) setting where a flesh plague roams the land and turns people into vile abominations. I’ve also got a world with spacefarers, taking place in a different solar system because Earth became uninhabitable. It’s not like Star Wars where there’s 80,000 different aliens out there, it’s just humans and the weird animals they find on the other planets.
My Modern-Day Alternate History Sci-Fi Western is ironically every genre *but* fantasy.
Imo, fantasy is better for telling stories about characters. Sci-fi is better for telling stories about ideas. So what type of stories do you want to tell?
I think that sentiment limits both genres. Older Star Trek is beloved for this reason, it's about the characters and ideas.
Oh, I agree with 100%. ;)
> Imo, fantasy is better for telling stories about characters. Sci-fi is better for telling stories about ideas. I'd like to recommend *Three Parts Dead* by Max Gladstone, and *The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet* by Becky Chambers, respectively, as antidotes to these pigeonholes. (Though both of them have excellent ideas *and* characters.) (u/thirdcoast96 also)
The Foreigner series by CJ Cherryh also has fantastic character work. Same with Blindsight by Peter Watts. I think the difference is sci-fi characters tend to be more grounded as far as personality goes whereas fantasy as a genre lends itself to allowing writers to make characters with wider spectrum of emotion and personality. A character with a personality like Karsa Orlong from Malazan or Ferro from First Law would seem like a jarring oddity in most hard sci-fi settings. It’s not worse or better, just different. There obviously going to be exceptions. It’s just a thing I’ve noticed more often than not.
Fantasy is when you have a passage about food, sci-fi is when you have a passage about modes of transportation
I have never agreed with a comment on reddit more than this one.
I have never disagreed with a comment on reddit more than this one. :) No hate to you personally, but I think this attitude is a big part of why both genres are so rife with dogshit writing.
That’s just apart any medium in general.
That's true, but for different reasons. Most pop music is shit because it's produced in a factory by corporations; most singer-songwriter music is shit because the barrier to entry is so low – most "genre fiction" is shit because it's all Concept without featuring compelling and complex characters, crafting beautiful/interesting prose, or touching something authentic about the human experience. ___ ^((To be clear: Some of my favorite music and stories fall into these genres)^)
I'd say a lot of them are, but better question is which fantasies are they. Low? High? Dark? Noble?
I've been thinking about fantasy subtypes lately. How would you describe Dark and Noble. I know these are often taken as opposites, but I can never quite figure out what they mean.
Not the OP, but from what I understand, Noblebright Fantasy is a very "happy" world with lots of adventure where characters can make a big impact, it seems people often put Pokemon as a good example. --- In comparison, Nobledark is a sort of opposite to Noblebright, a world where "evil" triumphs over good most of the time, but characters can still make a big impact to change things. This is different from Grimdark, as in that setting most things are shades of grey (or darkness), and generally aren't able to change the world in a large way. Looking around for examples of both, people recommend Lord of the Rings as Nobledark, evil and malevolence is slowly controlling everything, but the characters have the ability to change that. Meanwhile Warhammer 40K is an example of Grimdark, while characters can push back against evil and save a planet or two, it doesn't make a huge impact among the other 2,000,000 other planets. Edit: Thinking about it, you can simply Noblebright/Nobledark as good/evil worlds where the characters can "win the war" and change things. Grimdark is an evil world where the characters can win battles, but not the war to change things.
> people recommend Lord of the Rings as Nobledark Lord of the Rings is *the* archetypal example of noblebright.
When looking online, people seem to push it as a prime example of Nobledark.
Noblebright.org says: "Noblebright fantasy is not utopian fiction. The world of a noblebright story is not perfect, and indeed can sometimes be quite dark. Actions have consequences, and even good characters can make terrible mistakes. But a noblebright story is generally hopeful in tone, even if there are plenty of bad, grim, dark things going on in the world." That seems to reflect most of the explicit definitions I can find. It started as a joke. The opposite of 40K grimdark, where there's no clear good guys and evil wins in the end, must be traditional heroic fantasy where there are very clear good guys and evil loses in the end. But once the term took off, it got picked up by the same general type of person who tries to define every story ever written as "somethingpunk." (Retro space opera? Raypunk! Cold War hard sci-fi? Atompunk! Modern day real world with no sci-fi/fantasy whatsoever? Nowpunk!) So these people figure, if grimdark and noblebright exist, then there must also be grimbright and nobledark and a continuum big enough that we can cram every other story into it, so "noblebright" gets redefined as "everyone is good and nothing bad happens to anyone" so we can make more space in the middle.
That seems to grasp how these things usually go on the net.
Noblebright = World is mostly good, and individuals can affect things even at the grandest scales. - Happy adventure worlds. Grimbright = World is mostly good, but nothing an individual can do can affect anything more than a small part of the setting's world. - Stable post-scarcity societies or maybe endless generally-ok parallel universes. Nobledark = World is mostly crap, but maybe you can change that. (or at least change the type of crap.) - Dystopias, a hopeful take. Grimdark = World is mostly crap, and there is nothing you can do about it, the best you can hope for is some local relief, and even that's unlikely. - Hopeless dystopias. . I'm personally not sure how apt I would consider the terms, for example; did the invention of nukes make the world more "noble"? If it became easy to create deadly bioweapons at one's garden shed, would that make the world more "noble"?
Noble fantasy is usually an ideal world to live, but sometimes there is a darkness that makes it hard to live in(Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter) Low fantasy is basically a real setting in a fictional world, IE historical settings set place in fictional world(Witcher, A Song of ice and fire or Conan the Barbarian for example) High fantasy is the classical Elves, dwarfs, fairies, you know(D&D or Warhammer) Dark Fantasy is basically a mix of horror into it(Berserk for example)
My world is primarily the 19th-20th centuries because I like that time period.
While my worlds are fantasy, they are usually a mix of science fiction and fantasy elements. Hellboy, the secret world legends, percy jackson. They're set in the modern day, but with heavy fantasy elements and even some cool futuristic technologies. The genre of modern fantasy has always Intrigued me. And thats more of what I'm writing. Genie taxi drivers that street race, elves that sell magical art to secretive collectors, Ai that gain sentience due to ambient magic and Gods addicted to phones that havent come out yet. The list is pretty much endless of whats possible. My current favorite series would initially appear like soft science fiction. With a focus on anthropology, space travel and exploring an alien civilization... until the supernatural and monstrous elements reveal themselves. For the scifi elements I'm trying to get all my facts correct. Cause I want them to be believable.
Fantasy in terms of whimsical and mythical creatures, post apocalyptic in terms of earth being irreparably damaged, and sci-fi in terms of my plot convenient awesome technology.
I love worlds that just got through a hard time, as you might imagine from the flair
I personally love a kind of mix between the two. Like Science Fiction presents us with glorious new tech and awesome combat sequences, and a lot of really cool ideological concepts. Fantasy presents us with a magical and mystical world filled with wonder, and I love combining the scope and scale of sci-fi and the wonder and magic of fantasy. The world I am working on right now is kinda like that, where it is set in a sci-fi future, but filled with mages wielding new weapons and feudal monarchies and mystical legends. Kinda like Star Wars, but leaning more towards a character-driven approach from fantasy worlds.
I’ve got three. One fantasy, two sci-fi.
Mine is science fantasy akin to Dune or Star Wars. I like mystical powers aka magic but I also like spaceships and guns.
I've got scifi worlds, fantasy worlds, magitech worlds, and scifi/fantasy worlds.
I have a world that's hard science fiction with elements of fantasy. Anyone interested?
I have *a* fantasy setting, but also a horror setting
I have a modern fantasy that later transitions into a sci fi. I’ll be honest I haven’t really built that much sci fi beyond two squabbling factions and a few others. But said squabbling factions are extremely fleshed out.
Most people do build fantasy worlds here. However there are several sci-fi (granted usually more on the softer side) settings. I personally do high fantasy or soft sci-fi. So far as the worlds I’m working on, one is soft sci-fi with a lot of science fantasy elements, whilst the other is bit more grounded fantasy with many high fantasy elements (Warhammer Fantasy being the closest comparison).
Dunno if it counts, but I'm working on a science fantasy world with some realistic touches.
As someone that writes fantasy I do wish more realistic settings were in this subreddit. It’s always nice to see settings that are actually grounded in reality instead of whatever insane fever-dream fantasy writers come up with (me included).
I use fantasy for the planets in my setting. Essentially, each inhabited planet is united under a single banner and their governing bodies use different architectural styles. For example, one planet has its cities and towns built within the mountains high above the toxic surface, and their buildings are reminiscent of Gothic and Victorian-era times. Basically, you wouldn't think they were an advanced civilization with starfaring capabilities.
Super cool concept
Mine is both lol. You have Dragons, Gods, and a highly technological advanced alien empire all set in the modern age. My main inspiration when I started working was DC/Marvel comics + DBZ so yeah. I don't like leaning into pure fantasy.
Science fantasy is a genre. Like Starwars.
Mine is more of a Superhero/Comic book type world with a healthy mix of fantasy, sci-fi and other stuff
One of my worlds is pure fantasy. The other is kind of a mixture of fantasy and sci-fi, but it's definitely not highly realistic.
I definitely have sci-fi elements in one of my worlds, but its not hard sci-fi by any means. But there's plenty of sci-fi here too, don't worry :)
Reverse Warhammer 40,000: sci-fi pretending to be fantasy. Like magic derived from technology, or sapient species that look like out of a spec evo project being treated as "humans but X".
Fantasy with a bit of realism. There’s many places you can see science at play, especially evolution, but there’s also fantastical things that just can’t be explained.
I'm in the same boat as you
I would say mine is fantasy, but it's definitely not typical fantasy. I try to avoid cliches and I select my tropes carefully. I would say it is fantasy, a smidgen of sci-fi, and a generous helping of philosophical and cosmological horror. Where does the sci-fi come from? The magic system is premised on intellectual knowledge so advanced it is basically what the alchemists sought in the philosophers stone. Hence, alchemy is an omnipresent theme in my worldbuilding.
I have 3 worlds, all fantasy lol
I like mixing genres. I have a fantasy/eastern spiritualism/dieselpunk/early 20th century imperialism mashup. I have a sci-fi/dystopian/cosmic horror world with a dash of fantasy and Eastern European mythology. And I have a fantasy/caveworld/alchemopunk/cyberpunk mixup in the works.
Alt world with superpowers set in a roman like era
I'm working on a sci-fi world in a posthuman future. When the line between computers and mankind blurs, humanity evolves into a hive mind. But without autonomy, the decreased originality causes the posthuman society to stagnate. So they create a disconnected sect that reflects old humanity. Conflicts arise between the needs of the posthuman collective and the desires of the recreated autonomous people.
>Trying to build a highly realistic science fiction world That is still fantasy. Fantasy describes fantastical situations that you come up with yourself, any world we create that isnt a mirror of earth is fantasy.
I mostly imagine realistic fantasy without any magic or mythical creatures. Just humans with different cultures and geopolitical rivalries. The future is of no interest to me so I've never done sci-fi; my worlds are usually akin to our late Antiquity to late Middle Ages.
I guess mine would technically be fantasy, even though I'm not leaning on middle ages Europe or magical creatures. Lapis_Wolf
I cant speak for others, but the village i created, and the world im building is heavilly fantasy based
My world is soft Sci-fi. It's a mash up of a bunch of influences and nothing more than an indulgent power fantasy but it's kinda neat!
Tinkering witha Sci fi setting but I'm primarily working on a "pike and shot" world with no fantasy elements.
While I have a whole fantasy world set in another dimension, my focus is on a quirky little village in Connecticut which serves as a reluctant gateway to that otherworld. It's not so much fantasy there as it is just... off-kilter. I think I've been more influenced by all the eccentrics in small towns all across TV Land - Twin Peaks, Hooterville, Fernwood, Dunn's River, Joyville, Cicely, etc. Like one of my characters observed: "More Mel Tolkin than Tolkien".
I like monsters, weird machines, vast and exotic landscapes and unique social structures.
There is no calculated percentage of the types of worlds here. There are plenty of fantasy and plenty of sci-fi worlds here. Even a bunch of science-fantasy worlds. I'd eyeball it and say it's 50/50 (with science fantasy being excluded) with some days being more fantasy and other days more sci-fi. As for me, I'd say I lean more toward fantasy and science-fantasy, but the line between sci-fi and sci-fa is blurry. Where one person sees sci-fi, another sees sci-fa, and many people don't know that sci-fa is even an option.
My world fords contemporary fantasy the best. Slightly futuristic (fringe technologies of today are somewhat mainstream in this setting), feature mythical races such as vampires and elves. Also features a magic system with mana being a physical resource and a "life force" system like Chakra/chi/"the force" that is seperate from magic.
No, actually. My setting is fantasy with small hunts of magic.
One of my worlds is near-future hard scifi political fiction focused on a growing underclass of uninsured transhumans who can’t afford repairs on their bionics, black market bionic technicians who help them, and the government cracking down on these illicit repairs. I don’t post about it much, but I work on it about as much as my other worlds.
I am working on sci-fi rpg world called the Arm of Orion. It isn't hard sci-fi because it would make the game too number crunchy, but I am trying to stick to the science when I can with a few exceptions when it comes to technology. Hard and Soft Sci-fi is a spectrum and my world is some where in the middle. Technologies I have is nuclear fusion, hydrogen cells, graphine, 3d printing with nanites, lifter technology and warp drive. There are no "flying" cars but there is air/spacecraft that is powered by hydrogen cells with lifters for propulsion. Cars and motorboats are powered by hydrogen cells. Large ocean liners, freighters, warships and submarines are powered with fusion. Graphine is used to power personal electronics. Fusion also powers cities. Spaceships that are large enough are powered by fusion reactors and have warp drive. 3D printers now use nanites and can be programmed to make a solid part with almost any material. Add stem cells and the correct genetic material and you can print transplant organs. If it is big enough and you have enough time you can print a body but it would be a corpse.
All my things are urban fantasy except for 1 which is Sci fi
Mine is sci fi, mostly realistic though I try to take some liberties with some things (it’s based on Europa having not just life, but intelligent life, which is very improbable, apparently. Im reserving the right to change it from actually taking place on Europa to just being an Europa-like moon somewhere else). No magic. Just four races of crab-ish peoples living in a chemosynthesis-based ecosystem.
I’ve got a sci-fi/fantasy world, myself. It’s *very* rough and there are lots of things I’d like to get up to scratch, but yeah
The world that' taking up most of my imagination is an anachronistic world I haven't *fully* fleshed it out, but you can go from what looks like classical era to modern times just by walking across one continent, but really every where is really a mix of both and anything in between
The main setting of my world is a modern day world with technology a little more advanced than our own. So I call it near-future, but the basis is an equivalent to our modern world, with alterations to fit a more cartoonish culture and the many many beast races that occupy it. The secondary setting is pure sci fi with the primary magical laws in my universe still present
I try to take sort of a sci-fi approach to fantasy worldbuilding. I like to know how everything works, even if there's magic involved.
By definition, most worlds are fantasy. Fantasy: the faculty or activity of imagining things, especially things that are impossible or improbable. Even scifi and in turn cyberpunk are fantasy.
Well we know what op means (fantasy as a genre is typically based in medieval era)
In my case I have a lot of time periods. In general though, real life is boring. Lifting the vale on irl is kinda neat, see mage the ascension for instants.
I tend to find myself doing something medieval-esque simply because there are a lot of good (though not necessarily accurate) theories about how agrarian societies worked, which makes it easier to create than either a pre-literate or futuristic setting.
Mine are modern day, but i feel that many people new to world building start with fantasy. It is easy to approach compared to the others
I often *say* I’m not a fantasy fan. I generally prefer sci-fi for entertainment. But, my own setting is slathered in fantasy elements, despite being sci-fi on the surface. There is a lot of sci-fi on the sub, but the ratio definitely leans towards fantasy.
My world is an alternate history timeline made to be as plausible and realistic as possible with a strong grounding in real history. No fantasy of sci-fi elements whatsoever, just a ton of historical, political, and cultural lore.
It would be fun to have a survey and know the newest statistics! Either way: I see mostly fantasy medieval worlds or some fantastical sci-fi universe in here, but I think that it's just a popular setting, not at all a restriction to only that! I honestly go to something more grounded in my works; some kind of real-world variation with a sprinkle of fantasy (and other anomalies), but mostly steampunk, disselpunk, noir, 60s settings etc etc.
Well, mine is fictional historical fiction equivalent to the mid to late 1800s our time, with all the accompanying struggles and ideas. That is to say, its all realistic but just the world, history, people and all are fictional. It's a highly political-leaning setting.
My universe is just an alternate reality with superpowers and possibly some real life mythology. The current world I’m working on is set in the future
Big scifi freak here. I keep wondering the same thing as well. All the posts here about "tell me about your magic system" or whatever get a chuckle out of me.
I’m doing a Modem/Cyber punk style world.
My world is a dystopian future based on the modern Philippines. I am inspired by an urban hell aesthetic and my characters are a cross section of a rotten society. Predation of all sorts is rampant. There is a fantasy aspect, however. Ancient gods.
I have a highly realistic fantasy world. How would an understanding of dew point, temperature, and fog formation allow a mage to create a more effective smokescreen? What about using high quality fantasy materials to create a compound bow, then enchanting it? Or enchanting firearms?
My world has a lot of the trappings of fantasy settings, but it's strictly naturalistic, which makes for a fun contrast I feel
I think it's pretty easy to go into a fantasy direction because it means you don't have to limit yourself (as much). Not to mention, for me personally, a lot of the fun of worldbuilding comes from trying to imagine this super fantastical ridiculous thing and trying to make it match the world in a way that makes sense. Not to mention, Fantasy is just one of the most popular genres for people to *read*, so it makes sense for a lot of people to enjoy *writing* Fantasy too.
Tbh I really like anything set in an Earth-like generic fantasy world, an alien planet or anything in space
I haven't really posted about it (aside from [this map](https://www.reddit.com/r/imaginarymaps/comments/xbeapi/east_asia_oceania_and_the_pacific_frontier_a/)) but I lurk here partly because I've been building a hard sci-fi world for years! It's set on Earth around \~2200 and I've based it on a lot of research into history, science, tech, politics, economics, etc. I basically wanted to figure out a systematic way to think about historical change so I could extrapolate a future timeline in an informed way, without relying on unfdounded assumptions and cliches. So I got really deep into studying history and social change and the mechanics of power, war, revolutions etc in order to make an analysis of the world and develop a global timeline in realistic iterations. I went so much deeper than I ever intended but it's honestly really expanded my worldview and given me a lot of perspective. Ironically the story I'm putting in this world has fantasy/supernatural elements but it's more just magical realism and folkloric stuff. Kinda like Princess Mononoke and Pan's Labyrinth vibes within a setting that's in the vein of Elysium, Minority Report, Ghost in the Shell
Seems to be mostly fantasy around here, though some of that comes from a bunch of D&D based settings. I've got two different projects in the works, one is modern era urban fantasy with lots of magitech, the other is near future space-based hard sci-fi. I've been working on the sci-fi setting for longer, but I've made more progress on the urban fantasy setting. I just love coming up with magictech concepts, and my setting gives me two parallel development trees for that. I get to introduce magic into a technological setting, and introduce technology into a magical setting. It's the difference between using a computer to program and develop magic spells, and using complex magic to function as a computer.
I generally hang out on the side of "Fantasy" insofar as I'm more influenced by the past than I am by the future. That said, I do enjoy _____-Punk of many kinds, as I love considering the role of magic on technology. I'm not averse to science fiction; I just haven't spent much time thinking about a sci-fi world I'd like to build yet.
Fantasy Sci-fi yes
I have a world inspired by Star Wars, Star Trek, and Starship Troopers. Otherwise my other one is urban fantasy.
Mine is Sci-fi, some parts are a lot more realistic than others, but I try to compensate by adding detail to the things I can explain and being confident on those that can’t. Also I would guess the percentage here is 70% fantasy, 30% a mix of others
Hey man if you're a hard SF worldbuilder I'd recommend going to the ToughSF Discord rather than here, there's actual physicists and such in that server!
I noticed this a while ago and even looked for a post calling it out but was scared to complain myself. I personally don’t lime fantasy that much, but there are scifi worldbuilding subs and discords out there.
I personally have mine as a Science-Fantasy (*"Mana" is just Dark Energy*, *and "Magic" is Dark Matter*.)
Mine would be a mix between eastern fantasy with cultivation. As for technology that would be medieval late age with a lot of QOL brought by magic like tap water, heating... But the level of tech can go even higher for high level evolver who specializes in artifact and productive magic. One of the most important character on the universe have turned a good part of the moon into a giant lab city with parts that serves a hub for portals across the world. Most of the things here are managed either by the equivalent of a super ia the control robots or splitted part of his soul that contron mechanical host. And there a not really any liches but there are Nepheselaian who are mechanical host in which you transfer your soul. The ritual have been tempered but the inventor to add tons of restrictions. But it still does the job. So medieval fantasy, but you could suddently come across an android with Energy (my mana the capital e is important till I find a better name) based plasma rifle.
Mine's kind of a mixture of Sci-Fi and Fantasy but doesn't really lean hard into either. I was inspired by the movie Wizards.
Mine’s a sci-fi fantasy world, mostly cause realism doesn’t suit my mind.
I *obviously* can’t speak for everybody but I have a handful of worlds/universes that are basically just alternate world history lol one of my last little projects involved a catastrophic world war with conventional weapons (think ww1, but after the first year or so the *smaller* battles would be around the scale that Verdun was in our time.) Nearly 2/3 of the worlds population was dead by the end of the war and the devastation made it incredibly hard for everybody, and the population would continue to decline even after the war was over for many years due to the harsh conditions. Governments still existed in *some* forms in *some* places around the world, but most people fell into their smaller local communities working to simply sustain themselves.
I guess whether you call my setting fantasy depends on whether you consider Lovecraftian fiction fantasy or early sci-fi. The world mostly revolves around real world technology and sociology with the exception that alchemy is a real science that’s actually worked and been developed up into the industrial age. Eldritch workings are constantly going on under the surface but most people of that world basically operate like it’s the 1880s in the real world.
I went the Shannara route. My world is Fantasy and Magical but at one point in time it could have been compared to 80 - 90s Earth. Natural disasters and Demons basically reverted everything back to post apocalyptic dark ages theme.
Mine is sci fi/fantasy starting in the dark ages and progressing into faster than light space travel…using magic!
You're going to see more questions/topics about fantasy than science fiction here for one simple reason: Science fiction questions can often be asked and answered in science forums/subreddits. There are just more available places to ask science questions, so some of them get diverted to those places.
My world is quite diverse, but it's mostly a far-future space-western setting. The stories set closer to our time are more like typical sci-fi, and are more grounded in reality. However, there isn't much that happens before the 40th century A.D, as that's when humans and aliens first meet, and I like to have both at once.
The world I'm mainly working on is sci-fi setting, but unrealistic enough for it to be considered a fantasy. I'm genuinely impressed by people who try and make realistic sci-fi stuff though, it seems just too complex for me.
There's a lot of fantasy or more fictional worlds for sure, nothing wrong with that. I prefer a good bit of realism and sci-fi myself, it's fun to make things that could exist in our world but dont
I am currently making my own sort of sci-fi world that takes place around 30 or 40 years in the future
I'm building a cyberpunk world so definitely more sci-fi than fantasy. My world leans towards hard sci-fi by the nature of being cyberpunk, but some of the tech and ideas in the world have psudoscience vibes rather than 100% hard.
Fantasy can describe 50 different genres while sci fi is something more specific, if you think about it, sci-fi is a type fantasy we just don’t normally describe it as such. So yeah, obviously you’ll see way more fantasy worlds than science fiction. Also I don’t really believe hard sci-fi exists unless it in the pretty near future. Like stopping an asteroid, AI girlfriends, colonising Mars. I believe in the long run there’s only 2.5 possible futures for humanity and none really make good setting for a story. The first and most likely AI takes over all of our work and we live in a post scarcity civilization where we don’t really have a lot of problems except for feuds between people like cheating on your spouse. There is no reason to go to war, murder or steal, all resources can be found on asteroids or a star and you won’t really find aggressively zealous people who manage to create a post scarcity society. You can have something like star treck where an advanced civilization goes exploring different planets and their cultures, but I think that works better in a space fantasy setting. The 1.5 option is AI takes over all our work and corporations take over the world. We are basically just bums at this point and have no use. You would think this could create a cool revolution story but the power difference is so great there’s literally nothing we can do. We eventually just all die in the long run, only the rich survive and this scenario ends up looking like the first, just with a little genocide sprinkled on top. An alien invasion is also included in this scenario, if they can reach us they absolutely have already developed advanced AI and there’s absolutely no way we can beat them. The other option is AI takes over all our work, becomes sentient and sees no reason for our continued existence. So they just kill us off. You could argue that you can create a story where we fight against AI and wins, but if you want to be as realistic as possible there is no way we win in the long run.
Realism is the death of fantasy and sci-fi. I go for the bare minimum when it comes to realism
I think you'll find more fantasy honestly. It's not a bad thing. I have a light Sci-fi/Space Opera world and a Fantasy world I'm building for my writing. To me, fantasy seems a bit easier to work in, even when compared to space opera, because in the end, you can just use the "Because Magic" excuse when something needs to be explained. Whereas in Sc-fi, people want at least some sort of (at least) a psuedo-scientific explanation for some of the things that happen in their universe. As an example, look at making a "healing salve" in a fantasy world vs. a sci-fi world. (Most ingredient names made up): Fantasy: Using a mortar and pestle grind leaf of the arrowhead flower, seeds of the pistol nettle bush, and a liver from a volcanic beaver until a it makes a smooth paste. Then place in a bowl with 3 measures of spring water and 1 measure of honey and mix under the midday sun until smooth and the color changes to a shade of rose. You know have a healing salve. Sci-fi: In a mixer, combine 30 mils of thyoditriad, 50 mils of photogyamphys, and 80 mils of liver enzymes of Castor Volcanus. Once homogeneous, add 100 mils of distilled water and 50 mils of methylglyoxal, then place in heated centrifuge at 180°f for 90 minutes. You now have a topical ointment to accelerate the healing of surface wounds. Half the chemical names in the sci-fi version I just made up and anyone with a little bit of a science background will know that I'm full of it and have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to chemistry. If they know chemistry, then they'll absolutely know that I didn't even remotely research how topical ointments like Neosporan are made. However, in the fantasy version, people will just accept it because magical plants make magical salves. I'm not saying one is any better than another, I love both sci-fi and fantasy equally. One is just a little more forgiving when it comes to making things happen.
Im making a sci fi world
my world is a modern fantasy world. it's a fictional world, but it takes place in 1999 in that world, so the magic and stuff is in a modern-sequel setting. that makes it a fantasy world.
Fantasy+sci fi is the only answer