a-sleepy-fan

[a-sleepy-fan]

🍖 How to Build a Culture Without Just Inventing Spices and Necklaces

(a worldbuilding roast. with love.)

So. You’re building a fantasy world, and you’ve just invented: → Three types of ceremonial jewelry → A spice that tastes like cinnamon if it were bitter and cursed → A holiday where everyone wears gold and screams at dawn

Cute. But that’s not culture. That’s aesthetics.

And if your worldbuilding is all outfits, dances, and spice blends with vaguely mystical names, your story’s probably going to feel like a cosplay convention held inside a Pinterest board.

Here’s how to fix that—aka: how to build a real, functioning culture that shapes your story, not just its vibes.

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🔗 Culture Is Built on Power, Not Just Style

Ask yourself: → Who’s in charge, and why? → Who has land? Who doesn’t? → What’s considered taboo, sacred, or punishable by death?

Culture is shaped by who gets to make the rules and who gets crushed by them. That’s where things like religion, family structure, class divisions, gender roles, and social expectations actually come from.

Start there. Not at the embroidery.

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2.🪓 Culture Comes From Conflict

Did this society evolve peacefully? Was it colonized? Did it colonize? Was it rebuilt after a war? Is it still in one?

→ What was destroyed and mythologized? → What do the survivors still whisper about? → What do children get taught in school that’s… suspiciously sanitized?

No culture is neutral. Every tradition has a history, and that history should taste like blood, loss, or propaganda.

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3.🧠 Belief Systems > Customs Lists

Sure, rituals and holidays are cool. But what do people believe about: → Death? → Love? → Time? → The natural world? → Justice?

Example: A society that believes time is cyclical vs. one that sees time as linear will approach everything—from prison sentences to grief—completely differently.

You don’t need to invent 80 gods. You need to know what those gods mean to the people who pray to them.

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4.🫀 Culture Controls Behavior (Quietly)

Culture shows up in: → What people apologize for → What insults cut deepest → What people are embarrassed about → What’s praised publicly vs. what’s hidden privately

For instance: → A culture obsessed with stoicism won’t say “I love you.” They’ll say “Have you eaten?” → A culture built on legacy might prioritize ancestor veneration, archival writing, name inheritance.

This stuff? Way more immersive than giving everyone matching earrings.

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5. 🏠 Culture = Daily Life, Not Just Festivals

Sure, your MC might attend a funeral where people paint their faces blue. But what about: → Breakfast routines? → How people greet each other on the street? → Who cooks, and who eats first? → What’s considered “clean” or “proper”? → How is parenting handled? Divorce?

Culture is what happens between plot points. It should shape your character’s assumptions, language, fears, and habits—whether or not a festival is going on.

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6. 💬 Let Your Characters Disagree With Their Own Culture

A culture isn’t a monolith.

Even in deeply traditional societies, people: → Rebel → Question → Break rules → Misinterpret laws → Mock sacred things → Act hypocritically → Weaponize or resist what’s expected

Let your characters wrestle with the culture around them. That’s where realism (and tension) lives.

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7.🧼 Beware the “Pretty = Good” Trap

Worldbuilding gets boring fast when: → The protagonist’s homeland is beautiful and pure → The enemy’s culture is dark and “barbaric” → Every detail just reinforces who the reader should like

You can—and should—challenge the aesthetic hierarchy. → Let ugly things be beloved. → Let beautiful things be corrupt. → Let your MC romanticize their culture and then get disillusioned by it later.

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📍 TL;DR (but like, spicy): → Culture is not food and jewelry. → Culture is power, fear, memory, contradiction. → Stop inventing spices until you know who starved last winter. → Let your world feel lived in, not curated.

The best cultural worldbuilding doesn’t look like a list. It feels like a system. A pressure. A presence your characters can’t escape—even if they try.

Now go. Build something real. (You can add spices later.)

—rin t. // writing advice for worldbuilders with rage and range // thewriteadviceforwriters

Sometimes the problem isn’t your plot. It’s your first 5 pages. Fix it here → 🖤 Free eBook: 5 Opening Pages Mistakes to Stop Making:

🕯️ download the pack & write something cursed:

[a-sleepy-fan]

Villain-Angry Lines

⤳ “You thought I wouldn’t notice? I let you think that.”

⤳ “I gave you mercy once. Look how well that turned out.”

⤳ “You want forgiveness? Die, and maybe I’ll consider it.”

⤳ “I didn’t lose control. I chose violence, don’t get it twisted.”

⤳ “I warned you not to test me. And here we are.”

⤳ “You were a mistake I plan to erase, thoroughly.”

⤳ “You think this is anger? No, this is fucking clarity.”

⤳ “If you hated what I did before, you’re going to love what’s next.”

⤳ “You made me into a monster, and now you’re shocked I bite?”

⤳ “You should’ve killed me when you had the chance.”

⤳ “I don’t need revenge, I need results.”

⤳ “The difference between us? I finish what I start.”

⤳ “Cry if you want, it won’t stop what’s coming.”

⤳ “You broke something in me. Now I’ll break everything in you.”

⤳ “Your screams won’t mean anything when no one’s left to hear them.”

⤳ “You don’t get to play the victim. Not when I’m still standing.”

[a-sleepy-fan]

Let's fulfill an apocalyptic prophecy with mama

[a-sleepy-fan]

That line delivery paired with Lou’s immediate full-belly cackling is giving me enough joy to power a small village

[a-sleepy-fan]

Rewatching campaign two is fun because now I can catch when Travis does something weird with Fjord’s voice or words, and you get to go “I saw that….”

[a-sleepy-fan]

Interesting that the Nein were so casual in talking to two powerful wizards. They went for it jokingly, saying "let's send Yasha and Beau" (admittedly the most not charming/persuasive members of the group, well except Nott). And boy. With Trent, they discovered really fast the party was over. This man is breaking the vibes in 2 seconds BUT !!

... I can't help but wonder if this was a genius move also.

I explain. If the Mighty Nein would've taken the opportunity more seriously instead of goofing around, they might have sent Fjord or Molly (Caleb would NOT have gone there). And maybe Trent would have recognized Molly from the scene in the Tri-Spires after the tower almost fell ! They were pretty visible after all. And Molly is much more colorful than Beau. OR maybe Trent would have suspected something listening to Fjord's smooth talk. Whereas how can you suspect a thing from a woman who declares openly she's from from Xhorhas, and has been in the Empire for less that eight months ?

I'm saying that maybe the fact that the Mighty Nein presented themselves a little like buffoons maybe saved them from ever having Trent suspecting they had something to do with the disappearance of the beacon. Because honestly, after talking to Beau and Yasha, I don't see how he coud ever suspect that.

[a-sleepy-fan]

⚔️ 𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗶𝘁𝗲𝗺! Moonfallen Bow
Weapon (any bow), legendary (requires attunement) ___ This bow doesn’t need to be strung. A twinkling glimmer of starlight appears between the bow’s ends when you reach for it: grasping the light and pulling it back, as if it were a bowstring, causes a string of light to materialize and draw the bow. An illusory image of the moon’s face appears in the space between the bow and its drawn string. When you draw the bow in this way, an arrow of pure light springs into existence and is nocked into the bow. You gain a +2 bonus to attack and damage rolls made with this magic weapon when firing an arrow of light, which deals radiant damage instead of piercing damage. The drawn bow and its arrows of light each shed bright light in a 10-foot radius and dim light for an additional 10 feet. Hit or miss, an arrow of light disappears immediately after the attack. A target that’s hit by an arrow of light is marked by a point of starlight, which moves with the target and sheds dim light in a 10-foot radius. Each mark remains until the end of your next turn. Whenever you move in a straight line toward a marked target, opportunity attacks against you are made with disadvantage. 𝙂𝙪𝙞𝙙𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝘼𝙧𝙧𝙤𝙬. While holding the bow, you can use an action to cast the “guiding bolt” spell from it, drawing the bow back as normal before firing the spell’s bolt of light from it. Use your weapon attack bonus with the bow for the spell attack, including its +2 bonus to attack rolls. You still add your Dexterity modifier, plus the bow’s +2 bonus, to the damage from this version of the spell. If the target is marked by a point of starlight, you also have advantage on the attack roll. 𝙈𝙤𝙤𝙣𝙛𝙖𝙡𝙡. As an action, you can fire an arrow of light into the air above you. When you do, pick a point that you can see within 60 feet of you. The arrow immediately winks out, and a cascade of withering, bright light descends from the sky 60 feet above the point…. … Continued in the IG comments below! Remember to sort by most recent and scroll down! ___ ✨ Patrons get huge perks! Access this and hundreds of other item cards, art files, and compendium entries when you support The Griffon’s Saddlebag on Patreon for as little as $3 a month!

[a-sleepy-fan]

Something that rules about the show that I've been trying to figure out how to articulate is about it's visual style.

Cause the thing is Jordan's books are extremely visual. He gets mocked sometimes for spending a page describing a single dress, but those descriptions all work to give such a huge sense of place, culture, and just wonder to his world.

And the show focused on that aspect so well. If you look at the artist depictions of the White Tower prior to show a lot of them are very simple and very samey. I say this as someone with a lot of love in my heart for some of those drawings: none of them real feel like a real place that might actually exist. But with the White Tower in the show it feels lived in: the exteriors shots are covered in windows and arches and walkways. The interiors are richly decorated and echoing. Little details lend to the personality of the whole location, and as a result to the Aes Sedai who call it home: the statues of the Warders and Aes Sedai, the stained glass windows, the balconies overlooking the city, the way every room is slightly curved and yet elegantly arranged.

Or take Tanchico as another great example: the choice to give it a distinctly mesoptimaian style and look, with stacked squared buildings of this ancient weathered stone, reflects that it's one the most ancient cities in the Westlands and one of the few that aren't Ogier built, as well as that it was built around the Panarch's Palace which is itself a remnant of an Age of Legends museum. You also feel the insatiability and the inequality in the air: crowded dirty streets tangled around each other, that are a far cry from the clean cosmopolitan streets of Tar Valon. It gives Tanchico a flavor that matches its character really well, ancient and yet decaying, a city of humans succumbing to human vice and flaws.

The series used everything it had to breath life and detail into the story, and in so doing every shot shows how much they cared. It may not be a one-to-one faithful recreation but no show ever would have been so instead it does something more important: it captures and showcases the underlying ideas that are the heart of the books.

[a-sleepy-fan]

Josha Stradowski as Rand Al'Thor in Wheel of Time S03E01

[a-sleepy-fan]

So Prime wants to focus on their other fantasy show, especially given their contract with the Tolkien estate. Fine.

It would make a lot of sense for Sony, the actual rights holders, to still want to make use of their ip especially since the show has momentum and a following right now, and take the show to a different streamer. And Apple TV does make a lot of sense as the best option, given their catalog of originals that are currently very sci fi heavy, to pick up a fantasy that can compete with house of the dragon and the rings of power.

So here’s hoping Sony and Apple TV agree. And we can help that process along and POLITELY ask them to consider it through every medium we can (such as socials like YouTube, Bluesky, and Instagram).

There may be hope for a Wheel of Time season 4+ yet! Don’t give up just yet y’all. Make your voices heard to #SaveTheWheelOfTime!!

[a-sleepy-fan]

Dragonmount, The wot fansite, said that they heard from insiders on the crew that there’s still a chance if people make enough noise.on other media.

MAKE ALL THE NOISE YOU CAN PEOPLE. CAMPAIGN BOARDS, VIDEOS, ANYTHING

[a-sleepy-fan]

earlier today sony posted a WOT clip on their youtube channel (from the rhuidean episode). it could just be poor timing of a random autopost to upload this less than 24 hours after it was announced that the show is canceled, or it could be that they want to continue posting s3 content just for awards purposes until awards season is over, but if i put on my tinfoil hat, i could suggest that maybe it's a sign that sony is thinking of shopping the show around to look for a new platform and is gauging viewer interest/engagement. regardless, can't hurt anything to give it a watch and express your support for the show!

(for those who don't know, sony owns the rights for WOT and they partnered with amazon to produce and distribute the show, so theoretically, sony could sell the rights to another streamer and partner with them to produce and distribute more seasons. it's a long shot, because this show is much more expensive and ambitious than just about any of the handful of shows in the past that have been saved from cancellation by a new network buying them, and because a new buyer would likely have to shell out money not only to sony for rights to make more seasons but also to amazon to gain ownership of the existing seasons to be able to host them on their own platform and that would add up to a high bill on top of the high expense of actually making more seasons, but it's the only shot we have.)

[a-sleepy-fan]

So Prime wants to focus on their other fantasy show, especially given their contract with the Tolkien estate. Fine.

It would make a lot of sense for Sony, the actual rights holders, to still want to make use of their ip especially since the show has momentum and a following right now, and take the show to a different streamer. And Apple TV does make a lot of sense as the best option, given their catalog of originals that are currently very sci fi heavy, to pick up a fantasy that can compete with house of the dragon and the rings of power.

So here’s hoping Sony and Apple TV agree. And we can help that process along and POLITELY ask them to consider it through every medium we can (such as socials like YouTube, Bluesky, and Instagram).

There may be hope for a Wheel of Time season 4+ yet! Don’t give up just yet y’all. Make your voices heard to #SaveTheWheelOfTime!!

[a-sleepy-fan]

I will get over it, it is a TV show and at this point I'm too fandom old to really let it bother me for a really long time.

It is just incredibly insulting to the actors, set designers, costumers, camera people, and everyone involved in making that show that so clearly put their heart and soul into it.

And for it to have been cancelled just as things were really getting started. We didn't end in satisfying places- we don't get to see what happens with Perrin, how Mat's memories were affected, how Elayne approaches learning about Rahvin, Rand leading the remaining Aiel, the WHOLE FUCKING FALLOUT OF SIUAN'S DEATH- there were so many hanging threads that still needed to be accounted for, things that were so clearly being set up.

I'm so mad at Amazon and disappointed for everyone who put everything into it. I don't know what is going to happen, whether Amazon might change their minds or if another platform takes over (I'm not optimistic about either outcome, but who knows), but I am deeply grateful to all the people who worked on it, and I will cherish what we did get.

[a-sleepy-fan]

I’m so mad. I’m so mad. I’m so mad.

“Financial reasons” my fucking ass.

Especially when Rings of Power gets renewed.

I’m so mad.

[a-sleepy-fan]

Still vaguely catching up with my Mighty Nein rewatch, and thinking about just how HUGE getting a lead box to shield the Beacon was. Like. Who knows how many big names from the Cerberus Assembly and the Dynasty would've been searching for that fucker when they knew it had been located and/or stolen again, only for it to have suddenly disappeared off the face of Exandria

You pop an airtag (Divination/Locate Object/Scrying/etc.) on the Declaration of Independence, because you know it's important as shit, and maybe you can use it to manipulate whichever side of the war you're on, and you've been tracking it, only to see it's been picked up by Agent 47 who is currently smuggling it out of an active aggravated attack combat zone; then suddenly. Your tag goes dead. That shit is FRIED. You lost the Holy Grail and have to assume it's been destroyed, and you now have to figure out how to proceed now that your one piece of leverage is gone. How are you gonna tell your boss about this

And actually, it's just sitting in a lead box in a pink backpack, being used as a really fancy once-a-day bong rip of possibilty 😌

[a-sleepy-fan]

Still vaguely catching up with my Mighty Nein rewatch, and thinking about just how HUGE getting a lead box to shield the Beacon was. Like. Who knows how many big names from the Cerberus Assembly and the Dynasty would've been searching for that fucker when they knew it had been located and/or stolen again, only for it to have suddenly disappeared off the face of Exandria

You pop an airtag (Divination/Locate Object/Scrying/etc.) on the Declaration of Independence, because you know it's important as shit, and maybe you can use it to manipulate whichever side of the war you're on, and you've been tracking it, only to see it's been picked up by Agent 47 who is currently smuggling it out of an active aggravated attack combat zone; then suddenly. Your tag goes dead. That shit is FRIED. You lost the Holy Grail and have to assume it's been destroyed, and you now have to figure out how to proceed now that your one piece of leverage is gone. How are you gonna tell your boss about this

And actually, it's just sitting in a lead box in a pink backpack, being used as a really fancy once-a-day bong rip of possibilty 😌