#realist fantasy

[skilasophia]

Longtime Sunshine

Somewhere near the city Surrounded by rapid transit stops Where we can design our own forest Within the square footage of a cottage home.

The living room: Chairs styled like theatre-in-the-round And a grand piano at center stage With ferns and minimalist decor Surrounding our windows.

[aethersea]

another thing fantasy writers should keep track of is how much of their worldbuilding is aesthetic-based. it's not unlike the sci-fi hardness scale, which measures how closely a story holds to known, real principles of science. The Martian is extremely hard sci-fi, with nearly every detail being grounded in realistic fact as we know it; Star Trek is extremely soft sci-fi, with a vaguely plausible "space travel and no resource scarcity" premise used as a foundation for the wildest ideas the writers' room could come up with. and much as Star Trek fuckin rules, there's nothing wrong with aesthetic-based fantasy worldbuilding!

(sidenote we're not calling this 'soft fantasy' bc there's already a hard/soft divide in fantasy: hard magic follows consistent rules, like "earthbenders can always and only bend earth", and soft magic follows vague rules that often just ~feel right~, like the Force. this frankly kinda maps, but I'm not talking about just the magic, I'm talking about the worldbuilding as a whole.

actually for the purposes of this post we're calling it grounded vs airy fantasy, bc that's succinct and sounds cool.)

a great example of grounded fantasy is Dungeon Meshi: the dungeon ecosystem is meticulously thought out, the plot is driven by the very realistic need to eat well while adventuring, the story touches on both social and psychological effects of the whole 'no one dies forever down here' situation, the list goes on. the worldbuilding wants to be engaged with on a mechanical level and it rewards that engagement.

deliberately airy fantasy is less common, because in a funny way it's much harder to do. people tend to like explanations. it takes skill to pull off "the world is this way because I said so." Narnia manages: these kids fall into a magic world through the back of a wardrobe, befriend talking beavers who drink tea, get weapons from Santa Claus, dance with Bacchus and his maenads, and sail to the edge of the world, without ever breaking suspension of disbelief. it works because every new thing that happens fits the vibes. it's all just vibes! engaging with the worldbuilding on a mechanical level wouldn't just be futile, it'd be missing the point entirely.

the reason I started off calling this aesthetic-based is that an airy story will usually lean hard on an existing aesthetic, ideally one that's widely known by the target audience. Lewis was drawing on fables, fairy tales, myths, children's stories, and the vague idea of ~medieval europe~ that is to this day our most generic fantasy setting. when a prince falls in love with a fallen star, when there are giants who welcome lost children warmly and fatten them up for the feast, it all fits because these are things we'd expect to find in this story. none of this jars against what we've already seen.

and the point of it is to be wondrous and whimsical, to set the tone for the story Lewis wants to tell. and it does a great job! the airy worldbuilding serves the purposes of the story, and it's no less elegant than Ryōko Kui's elaborately grounded dungeon. neither kind of worldbuilding is better than the other.

however.

you do have to know which one you're doing.

the whole reason I'm writing this is that I saw yet another long, entertaining post dragging GRRM for absolute filth. asoiaf is a fun one because on some axes it's pretty grounded (political fuck-around-and-find-out, rumors spread farther than fact, fastest way to lose a war is to let your people starve, etc), but on others it's entirely airy (some people have magic Just Cause, the various peoples are each based on an aesthetic/stereotype/cliché with no real thought to how they influence each other as neighbors, the super-long seasons have no effect on ecology, etc).

and again! none of this is actually bad! (well ok some of those stereotypes are quite bigoted. but other than that this isn't bad.) there's nothing wrong with the season thing being there to highlight how the nobles are focused on short-sighted wars for power instead of storing up resources for the extremely dangerous and inevitable winter, that's a nice allegory, and the looming threat of many harsh years set the narrative tone. and you can always mix and match airy and grounded worldbuilding – everyone does it, frankly it's a necessity, because sooner or later the answer to every worldbuilding question is "because the author wanted it to be that way." the only completely grounded writing is nonfiction.

the problem is when you pretend that your entirely airy worldbuilding is actually super duper grounded. like, for instance, claiming that your vibes-based depiction of Medieval Europe (Gritty Edition) is completely historical, and then never even showing anyone spinning. or sniffing dismissively at Tolkien for not detailing Aragorn's tax policy, and then never addressing how a pre-industrial grain-based agricultural society is going years without harvesting any crops. (stored grain goes bad! you can't even mouse-proof your silos, how are you going to deal with mold?) and the list goes on.

the man went up on national television and invited us to engage with his worldbuilding mechanically, and then if you actually do that, it shatters like spun sugar under the pressure. doesn't he realize that's not the part of the story that's load-bearing! he should've directed our focus to the political machinations and extensive trope deconstruction, not the handwavey bit.

point is, as a fantasy writer there will always be some amount of your worldbuilding that boils down to 'because I said so,' and there's nothing wrong with that. nor is there anything wrong with making that your whole thing – airy worldbuilding can be beautiful and inspiring. but you have to be aware of what you're doing, because if you ask your readers to engage with the worldbuilding in gritty mechanical detail, you had better have some actual mechanics to show them.

[cookinguptales]

I MEAN but wouldn't that be an incredible isekai series??

a modern princess whose job is basically just being a beautiful figurehead

grows bored with her vapid role in life and withdraws from society, riddled with ennui

only to fall into a fantasy realm where princesses have real political power

as well as important responsibilities that her subjects depend upon

and at first it's a comedy of errors as she realizes that none of her training prepared her for this

but then she grows as a person and applies herself to learning how to guide and guard this kingdom

and becomes the powerful and just princess she was always meant to be

...so I guess apparently my new favorite conspiracy theory is that kate's shoujo manga just underwent a MASSIVE genre switch.

[notanotherhornyfemmeblog]

Everyday I'm in the gym I dream some asshole butch lesbian gym bro will ogle me from the weights and come up to me to "help correct my form" while unsubtly copping a feel, and honestly that's my only motivation for even going

[bonesmarinated]

𝕿𝖔𝖚𝖈𝖍 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖜𝖎𝖙𝖍𝖊𝖗𝖊𝖉 𝖆𝖗𝖒, 𝖆𝖓𝖉 𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖛𝖊𝖑 𝖙𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖗𝖊𝖆𝖑𝖒 𝖔𝖋 𝖘𝖍𝖆𝖉𝖔𝖜.

[sea-buns]

Barbificer is my favorite multiclass ever simply because of the very true-to-life mechanic that is Tool Knack

[vyroskartdolls]

Hellgoat -Project II Infos:

fully posable with LED in eyes and candles which imitate a flickering effect

[icklewolfiekins]

hear me out

[fuulikoo-art]

I occasionally like to look back on my old artwork. Since there’s some years worth of work, I’m able to see my progression. It makes me wonder what direction my style will take in the future

[always-a-joyful-note]

Enstars sure is an experience. Did I miss anything?

[littleguymart]

(source)

[7clubs]

guys help i accidentally made my yjh design too fun to draw and self-indulgently bigender. don't mind me...

[meanbossart]

This is a gross ask (in a funny way) be warned,

I once saw a tweet along the lines of "Do you think you could use the spell Create Water into someones ass to douche?"

And it reminded me of Drow, the ultimate bottom.

I'm imagining Drow talking to Gale, "Do you have any scrolls of Create Water." And Gale, "What do you need it for? I know the spell, I can simply cast it for you."

And Drow tells him, with very little (or no) verbal filter. Cue poor Gale with the most defeated and disgusted face of all time...

And that's why he turned evil in your run...

Do you think this came before or after Astarion asked him how hard it would be to learn Mage Hand

Also, this reminds me of lengthy discussions I've had theorizing the sure-existence of a spell that simply begones the waste from your small colon that some historically renowned gay wizard most definitely invented at some point.

[fumifooms]

When Marcille roleplayed as Chilchuck’s wife because it’s a normal way to engage in gossip of course of course, her appearance is really just her as a half-foot in a common dress and two braids. Uncharacteristically simple for her, though she did wear those as a half-foot too. At the end of canon, Chilchuck, implicitly by the text ~filling the hole in her heart~ by doing her hair for her when she lost the will to care for it herself, puts it in two braids.

She’s one step closer to her "I wonder what Chilchuck would be like as a husband" fantasy…. Don’t give up girl dreams come true, keep asking him about spending the rest of your daily lives together Mfw his love language is acts of service

[ewwww-what]

Hey, do you mind if I take the rest of your under-developed antagonist? Yeah, i just want to give her a personality outside of being mean, do you mind?

[satisfactuality]

just a couple quick things about the discourse surrounding junior year that i think people should keep in mind

1) we get a week in between episodes to create theories and get attached to characters, the IH do not

2) a lot of the things that were treated as bits in the finale were treated as bits the entire time, i don't why some people were so surprised when they didn't have a big emotional conclusion

3) brennen played as much a part if not arguably more as the gm as the IH did. you were mad the rat grinders don't get their redemptions? brennen had them turn down the chance any time it was offered bc his story needed it.