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Of Magic and Mythical Creatures
For the second post of “What is Gunpowder Fantasy” I’ll be discussing the use of magic and mythical creatures in the sub-genre. (The bulk of this post taken from my guest post at A Way With Worlds)
Magic
Magic has been in fantasy from the very beginning of modern Fantasy. C.S. Lewis and JRR Tolkein both made extensive use of magic in their worlds.
So it would be natural that Magic would be another element of traditional fantasy that can be used to connect your Gunpowder Fantasy to the bulk of Epic Fantasy.
The exact nature of your magic system is up to you, but there are a few major points that you need to address when you’re building a magic system.
First, and with everything in your world, you have to make sure that you are consistent. If magic works one way at the beginning of the book, it needs to work the same way in the middle and at the end.
The Prevalence of Magic is usually one of the first aspects that I approach when I am building magic into one of my worlds. How common are magic users within your world? Are there mages and witches and wizards in every town and village? Or are they rare? Or is magic thought to be extinct except to a very select few?
One aspect of your world that will be affected by the Prevalence of Magic within your world, and one that not everyone considers when they are building their world, is the Impact on the technology of your world. If magic is extremely common, then technology will develop differently and perhaps more slowly than in a world where magic is rare or nearly extinct. Why develop improved weapons when everyone can cast a fireball with their minds?
Something that will affect and be affected by the Prevalence of Magic, is the Source: how does one go about becoming a magic user. Is it a natural gift? (Here you can increase or decrease the prevalence of magic by deciding on how common the gift is.) Is it a knowledge based system that only requires study and how common are the books that teach magic? Is Magic only gained through some ritual and how difficult are those rituals to perform? Lastly, can magic only be gained through some accident or event? This particular source would be best paired with magic that is very rare as accidents can’t be controlled.
With the Prevalence and Source of Magic decided, another aspect that must be approached is the Energy of Magic. What gives the user the ability to cast their spells? Do your magic users have to carry talismans of power? Do they need to draw their energy from themselves or from the people around them? This can be another factor in the Prevalence of Magic. A system that is learned by anyone is all well and good, but if it relies on certain talismans that are very rare, then very few will be able to learn.
Limits of Magic is an aspect of your system that is very important. Magic systems without limits can become boring quickly if there is nothing to keep magic users in check. Even stories where the magic users seem to have unlimited power should have some weakness, otherwise the story can’t progress.
Limits can come in many different forms, several of which are similar to the Source of Magic and can tie into Prevalence. Your magic system can be limited by Knowledge: mages must learn spells and those scrolls or tomes can be rare. You can limit your magic through the Energy of Magic: if the mage has to draw from their own energy, at some point they should become exhausted and unable to cast new spells. You can use other magic-users as a Limit: anyone who grows too powerful or too reckless can be put down by other magic users.
An aspect of your magic system that is more open to personal interpretation is Divisions of Magic. This aspect isn’t integral to the system, but can add flavor to it. You can have your divisions “hard”: magic users can only draw from a single school or aspect of magic. Soft divisions allow magic users to draw on any aspect that they have access to (this ties into your Source and Energy categories).
The magic system that I use in my Griffins & Gunpowder universe is rather limited. I would rate it as “Rare” Prevalence: only a certain, random portion of Elves are born with The Gift. This covers both the Prevalence, Source and Impact: technology in this universe has advanced to rifles and early steam power. Magic users can draw from energy within themselves, and can “store” this energy beforehand to have ample supply, and some can draw on the energies and emotions of those around them.
Magic users in the Griffins & Gunpowder universe are limited by both energy and knowledge. They will quickly burn through even the largest “stockpile” of energy and must study spells to perfect them. This is further complicated by the fact that magic users have a Major and Minor aspect that are randomly drawn from one of the four divisions: Shadow, Light, Life and Death. Books teaching each of these aspects are rare and the magic users have to learn prerequisite spells before they can learn more advanced selections.
So, when planning a Magic system remember to maintain consistency and consider each aspect of your system and how it impacts the other aspects and your story in general.
Mythical Creatures
I was considering folding this discussion into the “Settings” part of my little series here, but I decided to give Mythical Creatures their own quick discussion.
Dragons are probably the best known mythical creatures used in Fantasy. They’re iconic. But there are many other types of mythical creatures that can be used to tie your Gunpowder Fantasy to mainstream Fantasy.
Going through the Pantheon.org Beastiary is a great way to find mythical creatures that could fit into your world.
You can use these mythical creatures as they were originally believed to be or you can turn the stereotypes on their heads and use your mythical creatures in a completely different way. I would suggest keeping the more popular mythical creatures at least vaguely similar to their more popular myths, but it’s your world.
What is Gunpowder Fantasy?
Several of the blog tour stops that I’ve been hosted at recently have asked “What is Gunpowder Fantasy?” It’s not an established sub-genre, so this question is definitely understandable. My short answer sums it up very well: Elements of epic fantasy (magic, mythical creatures, elves and vast scale) combined with rifles and railroads. But that only begins to scratch the surface of what Gunpowder Fantasy is, and what it’s capable of.
Setting
One of the things about Gunpowder Fantasy that can connect it to traditional Epic Fantasy is the setting that you build for your story. Traditional Epic Fantasy usually takes place in a medieval setting, with castles and kings and knights. In the Griffins and Gunpowder universe, the nation of Ansgar has been stagnated by a millenium of peace and prosperity. Castles dot the landscape, home to lesser lords and nobles. The King holds court over their people and pass decrees without consulting their advisors.
Other nations in my world have more 19th century cultures: open towns, railroads and industry. But the main part of the story remains true to settings typical of Epic Fantasy.
Setting will likely be one of the first things that you establish when you bring new readers into your world. I try to pepper aspects of Epic Fantasy with some of the more unique elements that Gunpowder Fantasy introduces to them.
You want to make sure that your setting will support the storyline that you’ve developed. For me, this meant changing the size of the world when I decided to go ahead and use steampower as a method of transportation. My original nation of Ansgar was barely a thousand miles long; with the addition of railroads to facilitate travel, my storyline would have been severely compressed. So, I stretched the nation out.
Scale
Another aspect of Epic Fantasy that you can carry over into Gunpowder Fantasy is scale. Epic Fantasy is known for telling stories of massive events that bring nations to their knees, of world-changing events that sweep up everything in their path. You can use the economy of scale in your favor, to give the readers something that they can equate to Epic Fantasies they may have read.
Scale can also help you set up a world that plays host to many different stories. If you design a world that is rich in history and populated by many nations, there’s no end to the number of series and stories that you can build on your world.
The world of Zaria is huge. Dozens of nations, both large and small, struggle against the elements, against each other and even against themselves across the face of the planet. The Ansgari Rebellion series will only touch on one part of this massive world; other series and stories will tell the tale of different nations, different characters.
Stay tuned for the next post on “What Is Gunpowder Fantasy?” in which I’ll discuss the use (or not) of Magic in Gunpowder Fantasy and introduce some of the concepts that become available when you write Gunpowder Fantasy…
The Wandering Mind
I have a problem that I think most creative people have: my mind is always creating new projects for me to work on.
My mind keeps creating new, interesting worlds that threaten to take away time from my current project (The Ansgari Rebellion series, right now).
The current distraction that is blossoming in the back of my mind is the concept of a sci-fi space opera written and released in a TV Series-style Episode format. There will a Series-Plot; inside of that, there will be Seasons which will each have a Plot; within the Seasons, each episode will have a plot.
The reason that this is threatening so strongly to consume my time is the recent announcement of the Kindle Serials program. Amazon is instituting a program in which customers can pay a 1-time amount and will automatically receive all future episodes for free, and automatically.
I’ve got the first three “Episodes” (approximately 50,000 words) plotted out with basic, one-sentence plot ideas for the next 3 episodes.
I might take a break and get these pounded out once I get The Hydra Offensive through the first draft. We’ll see if my resolve is that strong.
For my fellow writers, what’s threatening to take you away from the project that you *should* be working on?
When Is Good Enough, Good Enough?
I was having a conversation with a fellow writer the other day when he asked “Do you ever get worried that your writing might not be good enough?”
The question isn’t something that’s new to writers/authors. I think that self-doubt is something that just naturally comes when you are creating something and putting it out there for people to read/see/hear/etc.
Everyone has to work through this period of self-doubt in their own way. For me, I had a moment after a read-through of The Cerberus Rebellion. I had written, revised, revised, sent to a beta-reader, revised, sent to my editor for a substantive edit, revised, sent to my editor for a line edit, and finally revised again.
I realized that at this time in my life, it wasn’t going to spontaneously improve itself out of thin air. The work is only going to be as good as the writer that I am today. But in a year? Two? Ten?
Exhibit A: CommonScape
This was one of the first pieces of writing that I posted on the internet. It was fanfiction crossing the worlds of Andromeda and Farscape. I first published it in April of 2003, nine years ago.
Reading through the 55,000 words of this fanfiction now, I see so much that could be better. The plotting, the characterization, the setting. And that was with two worlds that I didn’t even have to create for myself.
If I go further back, 15 years, to the notebooks that are stored in my basement, I find stories that wouldn’t even make it to the Save button before I erased and revised.
“You can’t please everyone.” It’s a phrase that everyone says. It’s very similar to “You can’t account for taste” which is something my dad has said since I was a little kid.
I came to the realization that you don’t need to worry about pleasing everyone. You need to worry about pleasing yourself and realize that at some point, your work isn’t going to get any better right now.
So when you start doubting yourself, realize that at some point you need to let your baby go.
Religion on Zaria
Author’s Aside: Harry Vossen, creator of A Way With Worlds, has been very helpful and supportive of The Cerberus Rebellion, so I thought I would repay the favor. He’s running an IndieGoGo campaign to develop the funding for his novel, Under a Burning Sky, to be self-published in paperback, hardcover and special edition. You can find his post here. Stop by!
Religion on Zaria
This post was inspired by several posts over at A Way With Worlds covering the topic of Religion in Worldbuilding.
I have a particularly special insight into the matter of Religion. I was exposed to a great deal of study into the various major religions and their off-shoots; how those religions interacted with each other and what they believed. I’ve used that insight to help develop the various religions of my world.
Since The Cerberus Rebellion primarily deals with the nations of Ansgar and Kerberos, I think that I’ll limit myself to discussing the two major religions of these nations, how they affect their followers and interact with each other.
Kerberos
The Kerberosi, as descendants of Nordahr, have continued to follow the Nordahrian religion.
The Nordahrian religion is polytheistic: they believe in several primary gods and several major deities. Each of these gods has a different role within their religion: God of War, Goddess of Charisma, God of Justice. There are distinct priesthoods for each of the major gods and important deities; the people pray to whichever gods they think will aid them in whatever endeavor they seek.
While the religion is widespread throughout Kerberos, outsiders are tolerated but not given the respect that a follower would.
I based this religion on a conglomeration of the Ancient Greek and Roman Pantheons: belief that their gods will affect their lives through prayer and sacrifices, a pantheon that consists of gods that are able to take physical form, and various other minor aspects.
Ansgar
The Ansgari Religion is also polytheistic, but I based this religion slightly more on the Norse pantheon and rites. The Ansgari heaven includes a special place for heroes, their tradition is passed on through ballads, holy books and oral tradition. This religion is not only followed in Ansgar, but was carried there by colonists from Welos.
While the Ansgari religion is similar to the Nordahrian in that the majority of the citizens of the nation believe in it and follow its tenets, the Ansgari discriminate severely against those that chose not to follow the religion. Some of the religion’s deadly sins include apostasy and faithlessness. The largest effect of this is that when Kerberos was invaded, subdued and annexed by Ansgar, laws were put into effect banning the open worship and the Nordahrian language in any form.
My major characters aren’t particularly devote in their worship of the religion, but they do follow the general tents of it.
These are only two of more than a dozen different religions worshipped on the world of Zaria. As more of these come into focus, I’ll do more posts on those religions.
Politics in Fantasy
I recently did a post for Guild of Dreams (here) that discussed the differences in my writing. One of the things that I think really separates my writing from the rest of the Fantasy floating around is the blending of technology and politics with standard fantasy fare.
Politics can take many different forms and can be present in any government system that you decide to use: from a clan where everyone is vying for the favor of the Chief, to an aristocracy where the Nobility fight amongst themselves for power, and a Republic or Democracy where government officials fight for both power within the government and the favor of the voters.
Political interactions can be used for many things in your world, or not at all. For myself, I really enjoy building and tinkering with political systems and writing the interactions between different parts of the government. In many of the Space Opera novels that I have waiting for a proper write-up, I use the Political Interactions to drive plots and sub-plots.
From a major character’s entire occupation and their driving factor, to secondary plots that drive minor aspects of the story, to back-plots that are mentioned or foreshadowed, but don’t come to the foreground until they are ready to hatch.
In the Griffins & Gunpowder universe, with the nation of Ansgar in a Civil War, politics become a major player. And that’s one of the things that sets my universe apart from others.
As an example, two of the main characters in The Cerberus Rebellion are siblings; one inherited their family lands from their father and has worked to continue to grow the influence of the family. The other brother has taken over a neighboring Barony when the former Lord died without an heir. His brother, in order to avoid conflict with the rest of the nobility, arranges for his younger brother to inherit the territory.
The elder brother is focused, one may say obsessed, with expanding the family influence and this leads to actions and events that involve the politics of alliances, betrayal and double-crossing.
Guest Post on Magic for A Way with Worlds
I did a guest post over at A Way With Worlds touching on magic and some of the aspects of any magic system.
History as Inspiration
When I first started building the world of Zaria, I was just putting ideas together to see what worked. I weeded out the ideas I didn’t like and added new ones.
Once I had fully (well, I thought fully) developed the two halves of my world I started to see two patterns developing in the two story lines.
One half of the world was developing in a manner that loosely followed the events of World War 2. A nation that invades its smaller neighbors, a coalition of nations (including one across the sea) that join together to stop their common enemy.
On the other side of the world, the nation of Ansgar and the trials that it goes through are somewhat similar to the American Civil War (there are some very noticeable differences). It was made even more acute by the fact that the Ansgari-Rebellion series (name-in-progress since I decided to use my original idea “Griffins & Gunpowder” as the universe name) uses technology that was used in the American Civil War. I’m a huge American Civil War history buff, so it really doesn’t surprise me that my subconscious worked this into my world.
And I’ve decided to use the similarities to draw inspiration from the battles and events of the American Civil War, albeit with a decidedly Griffins & Gunpowder twist. You’ll just have to read it to see… The Hydra Offensive is at 8k words and counting!
Humble Beginnings
I think I’ve mentioned it before, but with my first set of Griffins & Gunpowder short stories getting ready to launch and The Cerberus Rebellion so close to publication, I thought I would revisit the flash in the pan that started it all.
This short piece of fiction was written on my phone, though I couldn’t pinpoint exactly when. It was probably during a slow point at work when I had the chance to type it out in Google Docs.
It was done in April of 2011 and for about 4 months, it just stewed. Finally, in August the story took off. So, without further ado, here is the short story that was titled “Griffin Steampunk”.
The hunting party rode slowly along the low rolling hills, buffered from the wind and light drizzle by their thick, fur lined cloaks. They had been riding in the fields and hills for the entire day and had yet to see any of the prey that they sought.
There was sign everywhere along the low hills that there were Griffins in this part of the country, but neither the party scouts nor their hunting hawks had come up with anything.
“My Lord,” one of the riders shouted from the hilltop. “Griffins, about three lengths ahead. A whole flight of them!”
“Lead the way, Alvars!” Lord Thomas Collins, Baron of Shadow Ridge, shouted to his armsman.
The hunting party turned, their large horses climbing the hill with little effort, following the scout. Armor clattered as the riders picked up speed, their cloaks flapped behind them as they road hard toward the flight of griffins that they had been tracking.
As the party neared, they slowed to a trot. Griffins were notorious for having impeccable hearing and for maintaining a keen watch when they were away from their avaries.
“Armsman, bring me a rifle!” Thomas shouted to the back of the party. While swords were the primary weapon on the planet Gregorov, rifles were the hunting weapon of choice. One of Lord Collins’ armsman dismounted and pulled the long gun from its holster at the horse’s side.
“My Lord,” the armsman handed his lord the weapon as Thomas dismounted from his horse.
“Thank you, Vance,” the baron said as he flipped open the caps on the scope.
The rifle, a meter long, weighed at least ten kilograms and was of the finest make on the planet. Thomas had used the rifle since his tenth birthday, though he had to use a mount until he could carry the weapon himself. Now, he hefted the barrel with no trouble and brought the stock to his shoulder.
The scope was high powered, it brought the beasts so close that Thomas could seen the individual feathers on each of the beasts. The male Griffins were covered in spikes, the females were smooth backed. Males were much larger than their mates, but were less valuable as trophies because of the ungainly spikes.
Thomas settled on one of the females, stalking along the side of the hill with her ears pinned back against her skull. Thomas held his breath and settled his sights on the beasts’ chest and flicked off the weapon’s safety. He braced himself against the ground and squeezed the trigger.
The rail gun thumped as it spit the the bolt of metal at supersonic velocities. It took mere seconds for the round to reach its target and Thomas could hear the screams of the other Griffins as they lifted into the air. The hunting party lowered themselves as much as possible: a flight of angry Griffins was nothing to be trifled with. The beasts circled for a few minutes before they finally drifted toward the cliffs, retreating to their avary.
“Let’s go see what we’ve got!” Thomas shouted as he handed the rifle back to his armsman. The party remounted and took off at a gallop towards where the Griffins had been.
The party had stopped at nearly a full length from the flight of Griffins, so even at a full gallop it took almost ten minutes for them to reach the corpse of the majestic beast that had been their target. The scouts arrived first, their smaller horses were faster than those of the armsmen and nobles, and they circled the corpse slowly. Even as he approached, Thomas could tell that the scouts were talking to each other about something.
As he approached, Thomas quickly realized what had the attention of the scouts. The corpse of the female Griffin had fallen where the beast had stood, but there was something else. Laying in a small stone circle were a trio of baby Griffins. Their wings were still tucked back against their bodies, a sure sign that they were not yet able to fly.
“What should we do with them, My Lord?” One of the armsmen asked.
“Griffins are dangerous animals, My Lord,” Thomas’ master-of-arms suggested. “We should put them down.”
“My lord,” Thomas’ advisor interrupted. “Griffins could be a great asset. When fully grown, they could support riders. And even if we can’t ever train them, their wings could be clipped like a trophy hawk and they could be prize animals. Imagine walking into the King’s Palace with a trio of Griffins at your heels. Everyone would respect your power and wealth.”
“Alexander,” Thomas looked to his oldest son, and most accomplished horse trainer. “Do you think that you could train these beasts to carry a rider?”
“If there is a beast that cannot be trained to take a rider, I have not come across it yet,” Alexander nodded. “They won’t be of size to take a rider for at least nine months, and in that time we could train them to be hunters.”
“Very well,” Thomas nodded. “We’ll take them back to the castle.”
And from that, the Griffins & Gunpowder universe was born. It just goes to show how far a story can wander before it finds its home in your head. Have you ever written down a quick idea and had it morph into something very different before you finally started writing it in detail?
A Character’s Death (Excerpt)
This is an excerpt from a future novel in the Griffins & Gunpowder universe. It wandered into my head tonight and I just had to get it written.
Flares continued to explode overhead, flashing white against the black of night. Fires burned in every corner of the fort, the result of powder magazines struck by explosive rounds or incendiary shells gone awry. Spouts of fire and smoke erupted from cannons and muskets all around him.
The smell of blood and burnt flesh was thick in [Name Redacted]’s nostrils. The air was hot, despite the late hour, and heavy with salt from the sea. Acrid gray smoke hung in rolling clouds and stung his nose; black pillars rose from the fires.
He could taste blood as well, from where the rifle butt had split his lip. The dry, bitter taste of gunpowder and the sweet salt of his own sweat were on the tip of his tongue.
Through the ringing, he heard the crackle of musket fire, the booming rhythm of artillery batteries lobbing rounds across the battlefield, the screams of the dying and shouted commands on all sides.
And as he stared down the barrel of the smoothbore cannon, his men skidding to a halt behind him, [Name Redacted] felt nothing.
The ten pound cannon had been rolled down from its place on a small ramp and turned inward, toward the attackers that had breached the clay walls. The gun sergeant stared at him with cold green eyes, lanyard pulled taught and gripped in a gloved hand. The gun’s officer was shouting commands, but not even his crew could hear him through the roar of battle.
[Name Redacted]’s heart beat twice, and then the sergeant yanked on the lanyard
What do you think?
Gunpowder Fantasy 