To build or write?

Well, I have been thinking, and writing in a half realized world is hard. Sure, it is easy when the setting isn't important, but I have realized something with my experience when doing role play: Having every thing ready is easy to write in. A pre-made world where you know where everything is and how things work.

Anyway, I was wanting people's opinions. If you are going to create your own universe complete with a rough time line, would it be better to jump into the first work, or would you build up the world, it's history, it's culture, and places first?

With my work I have probably talked a lot about, I plan a trilogy of 3 relatively short books, and if I do good with those, branching out into in between stories and things from before and after the books.

I already have maps of the Tharaisan (Mars) Colony/Nation with cities marked, I have histories drafted up, and cultural conventions and attitudes of different regions as well as economic status of the place already there. I have been considering how Earth politics and alternate history have effected the planet as well as the global economy, and many other economic-political-cultural things.

But this I have been doing on the side, and it is all very rough and not THAT developed. Should I just focus on characters and plot, or should I go dive into world building? I know there is a world building forum, but since I am also asking about whether or not it actually helps when writing your story or not, and if it is just as worthy of attention as characters, I think it deserves to go here.

What do you guys think? How important is world building in the scheme of your plots, and character's adventures?

I personally place a lot of importance on world building. It's probably why I haven't actually started on writing anything else about my stories. The way I figure it is that stories shouldn't be pre-planned. At least not entirely. Only the world should be pre-planned, set up with it's own history, events and rules. Then, from the setting, a story is supposed to sort of arise naturally.

If a setting is sufficiently developed, then certain events within that setting are more likely to occur than others. I think this should at least generally guide your story, because you don't want anything in it that breaks the rules of your world or seems out of place or contrived.

A story just sort of seems to naturally follow after that.

edited 23rd Apr '11 11:59:08 AM by Gault

This question is very hard for me, for I think world building and story writing sort of go hand in hand. I hardly ever start by building a world and hoping that some semblance of plot arises from it. Neither do I ever start writing a story and completely ignore the world the story takes place in. The story builds the world and the world writes the story.

For me, the story is the most important thing, so I would most likely form the world to fit the story, whether than the story fit the world. On the other hand, having a believable and complete world is also believable. And the more of the world I build, the more I can enhance the story. I often go back and forth between story writing and world building. Sometimes taking a couple of days to do one, and then switch to do the other, than switch back. But while working on the one, I never forget the other. It's sort of hard to explain, but as I said, they're sort of one and the same for me.

World build while you write. That's what I think the best way to go at it is. You discover a lot of quirks and stuff when you writing something..

I more meant which one do you initially focus on at first? You can't really build a world that great without some plot in mind, unless you have a lot of free time or something I guess lol.

Some stories do not need really any world building, but some do, and some a lot. (A mystery novel wouldn't, but something like Stargate would need a good deal, and Star Wars is it's own 'universe')

edit: when I said stargate I ment just the original movie, not the whole verse

edited 23rd Apr '11 6:59:04 PM by jasonwill2

I figure out what I want to do with the plot, and fit the world to those needs, and then springboard off of those specifications to help the plot, which will then form the world further, making an absolutely wonderful cycle.

I do this in stages.

Usually, it begins with a bit of world-building to set the scene. Then I write plot and characters, and generally come up with a good plot or character idea that doesn't work in the setting — so I alter the world slightly and continue to write. So on and so forth.

I did most of the basic layout of my world first; basic geography, climate. Then I threw in the rules for magic, then I threw in my characters, and then I built the city that most of the action takes place in or near.

And then I decided to set the first act somewhere else. :P

Insofar, I have the questionable habit of building characters, some settings and most major plot points... Then writing the rest by the seat of my pants.

During prewriting, characters are always the first to come to me, then the world, and then any plots. When I write, I start with a character and introduce the world while simultaneously setting the stage for the plot. I also prefer to introduce the world in chunks as I go along, because I really hate infodumps.

I use a mixture depending on what's coming to me the easiest and fastest. Sometimes it's scenes/dialogue/action and the world develops out of what I've written, sometimes I have clear ideas on the world and I write copious notes, even spreadsheets.

Same with characters, sometimes its easier to come up with the character traits, skills, equipment etc and compile a dossier on the character other times, in the course of writing, the characters just do things or reveal things about themselves/their past that fit with how the character is.

All of these things can happen within the course of a single story as I switch between world/character building mode and writing mode from day to day, hour to hour.

I also write stuff that creates a background that never turns up in the story itself - it might be a random "slice of life" in the world or a story of how two characters met or a pivotal point in a character's life - but it makes the world/characters more real to me, I understand better and that comes through in my writing as I know the world or characters like I know the real world or friends.

I think things that are not in the book (or mentioned) flesh them out perhaps more than some trivial things in story, since if there was a significant event it could shape their personality. A kind of 'secret' part of the character's history.

I'm much the same as Wacky Meets Practical. I sort of do this in paired stages as I write. It also depends on the kind of thing I'm writing: If I plan for something to be a series, I'l sink more time into the world than if I were writing a one-of. Although that has been known to fluctuate; I originally didn't worldbuild much for my Always a Hero world, since it was supposed to be "Standard Fantasy Setting, but slightly off-kilter!," but I ended up with a stupidly complex world that I've planned a good three more books in.