Worldbuilding

AI-enhanced worldbuilding process: streamline creativity, automate tasks, and craft immersive RPG worlds with AI.

The Problem

Creating a custom fantasy world for RPGs is a rewarding but overwhelming task, requiring extensive effort to develop lore, maps, regions, political systems, and engaging elements like NPCs and magic rules.

The Solution

Use a structured process and AI tools, GMs can simplify the worldbuilding process, allowing AI to help with the more overwhelming aspects such as creating world regions, building history, origin stories, environments, backstories, and political dynamics.

9 Steps to Create Your World

Fantasy worlds are essential to any good RPG, giving players places to explore and make their own. For many GMs, building a custom world is a natural step, but it can be a huge overwhelming task—creating lore, maps, regions, cities, political systems, magic rules, and compelling NPCs take time and effort. That’s where AI becomes a game-changer.

The goal is to craft a setting where your players can explore, interact, and ultimately make their mark. By designing a world with deep history and interconnected elements, you're providing your players with a rich tapestry to weave their characters' stories into.

This means:

Creating a story first world where players backgrounds are a part of the world fabric.
Building a world that feels alive and rich with history and lore.
Presenting opportunities for characters to evolve and change based on their actions and the events they experience.
Allowing players to make choices that shape the world around them, giving them a sense of agency and impact on the narrative.

Here we will describe a step-by-step process to help you design a world for your campaign, covering everything from the foundational building blocks to crafting engaging storylines and integrating your players into the setting. Feel free to use all of, some of, or none of this process.

We’re not here to magically generate an entire world for you. Instead, our goal is to provide you with a structured framework that guides you in creating a deeper, richer world. AI serves as your worldbuilding assistant, offering a process to guide your creativity, enhance depth, and ensure nothing is overlooked while you craft a rich and immersive world.

Advice: Start with a big picture in mind, then focus on the essentials you need to begin your campaign. Begin small—create a town or region with basic geography, borders, and maps. Identify key power holders and their roles. Gradually expand by adding history, culture, and a hint of magic. Then move on to another small region and repeat.

Process: Each step comes with a checklist of questions as well as an output document that the AI will generate or update. You should work in the same chat window as much as possible. If you want to start over or create a new chat window, feed the AI the output documents of your world first, this will help train the AI on what you are doing.

Section 1: World Building Blocks

Step 1: Building Blocks of Your Word

Choose a world-building framework to define your world’s theme, tone, and unique elements. Then choose your tool of choice to manage all of your content. Finally, we will walk you through a 10 step question and answer process with the goal of teasing out your world.

Outcomes:

The world overview document is the document that you will continually update through this process. At the end it will be the master document that you can use to define your world and train AI to understand your world.

Example World Overview Document >>

Section 2: Terra Cognita

This section defines the known world, the essential elements, including its physical geography, political entities, cosmology, and technological advancements.

It encompasses natural features like biomes, resources, and landscapes that shape daily life, as well as kingdoms and empires influenced by geography, conflicts, and alliances. Cosmology, religion, and magic add depth to cultural beliefs and practices, while technological progress drives economic power and societal development.

By understanding the interactions between these elements, worldbuilders can create dynamic, immersive settings that foster conflicts, alliances, and cultural growth, providing a rich backdrop for storytelling.

Step 2: Biomes, Geology and Environments

This category defines the physical world through its natural landscapes, biomes, geology, and environments, which shape how inhabitants interact with their surroundings. It includes diverse ecological regions, geological features, and local environmental conditions that determine resource availability, landforms, and the stability of the terrain, ultimately influencing how societies develop and adapt.

Step 3: Cosmology, Magic, and Religion

This category focuses on the metaphysical structure of the world, covering the creation myths, gods, magic systems, and the planes of existence. Cosmology affects how inhabitants view the universe, shaping their religious practices, beliefs, and even their day-to-day interactions with magic or divine powers. This aspect can heavily influence the cultural and philosophical outlook of different races and regions.

Step 4: Technology, Economy, and Politics

This section addresses the advancement and resources of a civilization. It explores trade networks, technological advancements, and how economic hubs shape societies. The level of technology (whether medieval, steampunk, or advanced arcane technology) deeply impacts the world’s political and social structures, creating tension or collaboration based on wealth and resources.

Section 3: The Origins and Tales of Old

The Origins and Tales of Old explores the history, origins, legends, and significant events that shape the current world, offering context for societal dynamics, power struggles, and cultural practices.

It covers mythological beginnings, the rise and fall of empires, major conflicts, and recent history, establishing a rich background that influences the present. Organizations like religious cults, noble houses, and secret societies play key roles in shaping history and mythology, providing agents of change that impact the world.

Step 5: History and Mythology

The History and Mythology section delves into the origins, legends, and pivotal events that have shaped the current state of the world. Understanding the mythological background, the rise and fall of empires, and the conflicts that have occurred helps establish the dynamics of the present day, influencing how societies function and how characters fit into the larger story.

Step 6: Races and Cultures

Detail the different races, their origins, cultural practices, languages, and interactions with each other and the world. Make sure to keep in mind where they came from and where they live.

Section 4: Organizations, Story Arcs & Players

This section focuses on bringing together the various elements of the world to create a cohesive current state, outlining politics, organizations, religions, and major conflicts. It then guides GMs on structuring campaigns, story arcs, acts, and encounters to drive narratives forward, emphasizing player involvement. Finally, it details integrating players into the world by connecting their backgrounds to world history, providing them with agency, and building engaging, dynamic adventures based on their choices.

Step 7: Organizations

Organizations in RPG games are powerful tools for creating intrigue, driving conflict, and immersing players in a rich, interconnected world. They can serve as allies, adversaries, or neutral entities, giving players opportunities to form alliances, face challenges, or navigate moral dilemmas. Well-crafted organizations bring depth and tension to your game, ensuring that every decision has far-reaching consequences.

Step 8: Current State of the World
Pulling it all together. This is about understanding the relationships between your different elements. Provide a snapshot of present-day politics, organizations, religions, and key regions, outlining the major powers and ongoing conflicts.

Step 9: Setting the Scene: Campaign Ideas, Story Arcs and Acts
Outline overarching campaign themes, major and minor story arcs, and key NPCs that drive the narrative forward. Use campaign and story arcs across acts to plan your adventures. It is the job of the GM to set the scene and let the players determine the story. The story is written as you play the game.