WorldEmber 2024 Prep

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Introduction

Welcome back friends. Has it really been a year since WE23? I can’t believe how impossibly fast the last twelve months have flown. I continue to stand in awe of the amazing and creative community that has assembled around World Anvil. Each of you inspires me with your incredible imaginations and I am thankful for your encouragement and support. Gokrenxia is now about nineteen months old and just shy of 157k words, with almost 90k words added thus far in 2024.

Homework: Week 1 - The Pledge

Goal

Going into WE23, I was uncertain how likely it was I would be able to write 10k words. While I now know it is plausible for me to hit the 10k word goal, this year I’m more concerned about time availability. I’m setting my goal for 10k words, but with a significant dose of hesitation around whether I’ll be able to carve time out of real life.

Area(s) of Focus

Working through the homework in WE23 it became apparent there was a single thread I could pull to weave what would become the twelve Great Houses of the dwarven kingdom of Kungaroun. Reviewing my many stubs this year, I find myself wanting to fill in some fairly major gap areas and revisions.

The People

First is the people. Over the last year, my mental model of the elves have expanded to become multidimensional and the original 2023 write-up needs to be completely revised. There are now two different lineages of elves with very different physical characteristics: the light-skinned Sharizaad and the caramel-skinned Bahtzaad elves. The prolific culture of elven secret societies began to take shape and character with the fleshing out of the Hadymaar Brotherhood, the Order of Salijarna, and the Khudrohara.
I’d like to finally put some thought into the Ja’nakh horse tribes and add depth to the nomads of the Zuul’Hy Freelands. I would enjoy adding some personality, culture, and character to the Shar’elum, Arjeev, and Vyrian peoples beyond what is written today. I’ve had some ideas around trying to define the everyday things like;
As a stretch goal, it might be interesting to begin to explore the Rundaba, though they’ve not been overly impactful in the world to date.

The Orgs

Second is organizations, specifically I’d like to actually put pen to paper this WE around the Shaf Yadursmaj - the secret intelligence organization of Eastern Vath’azen. Then there’s the Tobechnny, the dwarven equivalent, and the unnamed elven group under Habri Qalekkt.

The Kingdoms

Third are kingdoms. There are the newer lands defined in 2024: Shavomyr and Tahlerun. How diametrically opposed those two elven kingdoms stand: one a vice-kingdom under the new imperial throne of Al’jymoor, and and another of loyalists devoted to the old ways. If I’m struggling for words here I might look to the dwarven lands of Kungaroun, which came to life behind the scenes of WE23, but has never been well-defined.

Customs & Traditions

I'd also love to drill wayyyyyy down to think about small details like what exclamations do the different races say, and what’s the history behind them? For example. in a recent episode of Tales of the Inner Council, Yahri Negdahe yells “Clouds and clay, woman!” when surprised.
Other recent thoughts around customs and traditions:

What do betrothals look like across the peoples?

What is it about the stars that draws the hearts of the Vyr?

How are birthdays celebrated?

Meta Review

After a thorough review of the meta, I find it's still largely appropriate. There are very small adjustments I've made (and a spelling correction or two) but overall it still adequately reflects the character and theme of Gokrenxia.

Homework: Week 2 - Cleaning House

Homepage Review

Broadly, I’m satisfied with the homepage. I like the theme, mood, and color scheme and think they appropriately reflect the overall character of the world. I did make a small adjustment to the intro, but am otherwise fine with it as is. I’ve never liked the three column layout for the Codex, Recent Articles, and Maps. Specifically I don’t like how the articles end up squished on smaller resolutions (ex: mobile).

World Primer Review

I created my the Gokrenxia Primer early in 2024, and am pretty happy with the contents there. I’d forgotten much of what I’d written, but it still looks pretty accurate to where the world has developed. I made a very minor change to include the names of the two new elven realms of Shavomyr and Lysandre.

Community Tools

Everything is enabled. My writing is being captured under the top-level Prose heading in the World Codex and sidebar. I’ve not started using subscriber groups yet, but perhaps this is something I could explore in the future.

CSS Wizardry

I’d love to say that I’ve moved all of my images away from the clunky style credit rectangles, but alas no. I’ve banged my head on the CSS for credits on and off for the last two months and haven’t been able to get it to behave like I want (which is a mouse-over effect on the image). When I can get it to work, I inevitably find edge cases where it doesn’t and end up rolling the changes back.
On the upside, I *did* manage to remap my sidebar settings to make it much more compact. I’m very happy with that change!

Homework: Week 3 - Inspiration!

Read a Book/Watch a Movie

It never ceases to amaze me how when we put aside our assumptions and get out of our routines, incredibly surprising things can happen. This was so obvious to me earlier this year during Summer Camp '24. Janet & Dimi challenged us to find an accountability buddy, which ended up having a profound impact on my staying motivated, brainstorming, and sharing in someone else's experiences (shout out to Tyrdal). This week's first task to read a book or watch a movie invoked a similar ugh reaction from me. But I wanted to be faithful to the process and am committed to completing my homework.
With that in mind, I searched for some of the top political intrigue and spy movies, since that's sort of where my Tales of the Inner Council stories are living presently. After a number of false starts (because I didn't want to purchase a movie), I sought out something I'd never heard of before that seemed like it might drive some inspiration. I ended up watching the first episode of Zero Zero Zero. Here's the trailer:

Content Warning

Substance abuse, suggestive situations, violence

I've only watched the first episode, but am completely hooked! Moreover, here were the notes I took to inspire some Gokrenxia worldbuilding:

Event

Inspiration

In one of the early scenes, an entire Italian village has come out, singing a collectively-known song as a procession moves through the rocky streets behind an ornately decorated casket

• What are the songs of the common folk?
• What are the trappings and ceremonies surrounding death?
• Is death a somber event, or a celebration?
• If this isn't a a funeral, what sort of things would the common folk celebrate?

The story of several aging patriarchs, each thinking about their legacies and how to best prepare the next generation.

The underlying concept here is very relevant to the passing of the King. The chaos that ensued from his final decree was the result of years of contemplating what his legacy would be. Additionally, I wonder what the protagonists' family interactions are like. It's not something I've explore deeply, but:

• Davu's family turned their back on the Kingdom
• Yahri's brother despises him, believing he stole the Council seat.
• Tashkerr's grandmother actively works against him.

A secret meeting in a forest clearing, bring together senior officers of an illicit organization.

I positively loved this early scene in the episode. It reminds me of the feel I want my dwarves to have. Even more than that, the reminder that all of the secret organizations in my world will have to have face to face meetings at some point. Where do those meetings happen? When? How do secret organizations gather?

A hidden safe filled with money and weapons, concealed behind a false set of shelves in a toy store.

Where and how do people hide things in Gokrenxia when they don't want them to be found? What sort of interesting contraptions have been developed by the more organized groups?

Betrayal!

One of the key characteristics in political intrigue is betrayal. You never know who you can trust, and where allegiances lie. Watch your back! Only family can be trusted! Or can they???

A character disposes of a body by feeding it to pigs

This one's pretty dark, but it made me wonder how people hide the evidence of their illicit acts in Gokrenxia?

In the intro, there is a gun wrapped in a rosary.

Faith, belief, devotion, and the actions those values drive us to take. This feels very close to home in Gokrenxia.

The story jumps from Italy to Mexico. Also, a young child is mortally wounded and dies after being caught in the crossfire between the "good guys" and "bad guys."

The decisions one person makes (in one Kingdom) have a real, significant, and unexpected impact in people in far away lands. This feels immediately impactful, as the new Empire in Al'Jymoor and Shavomyr, the break-away kingdom of Sanysgal, the freehold of Kurzniert and the dwarven lands of Kungaroun all have agents and agendas coming to a head in the Vath capital city of Stoverj

One of the factions is smuggling illicit goods in cans of chilis.

• What do smuggling operations look like in Gokrenxia?
• How do people move illicit goods?
• Are there special vehicles?
• What about secret routes?
• What jobs were created to support this enterprise?

In multiple scenes, due to concerns around being spied upon, there is a focus on ensuring cellular phones before sensitive conversations happen.

• How is covert espionage and monitoring conducted?
• What steps do people "in the know" take to avoid being detected?

There is a brief discussion about obtaining a message so it can be encoded and transmitted in a newspaper obituary.

• How are secret messages passed in plain sight in Gokrenxia?
• Do different groups pass secret message with different means?
• Are there magical and/or non-magical means to pass secret messages?

Isn't it true that sometimes the things that end up being the most satisfying and rewarding are the ones we had to struggle through?

Moodboard

In the shadow of the Great War,
Secret alliances are forged
In the bars and back-alleys.
Countless factions gather in the shadows.
Unlikely allies, clinging to hope,
Stand against the darkness,
And dare to defy the past.

WorldEmber 2024 Moodboard by Koragath

Create Your Playlist

I actually find music distracting while I'm trying to write, so I'm going to pass on this particular task.

Homework: Week 4 - Friendship!

Find a Community

I've been a member of the WA Discord server for quite some time and con readily attest to how amazing the folks are there. In fact, challenge-discussion is one of the only channels I lurk in regularly. The other belongs to my amazing chapter-mates of Seven Tomes. I spent some time this week talking to my fellow Tomies about our various plans for WE.

Make a Plan

As I mentioned in my Goal section above, I'm pretty concerned about my overall availability this year due to some new real-life requirements. Not having a central theme like last year also has me feeling less focused and prepared.
To try and combat that, and knowing the top line of my focus this year is The People, I captured the sections of the WA Species template. Last year, I found that having copies of Templates handy was very useful for drafting articles whenever and wherever I was.
I'm also drawing some additional inspiration for my Ja'nakh people group by researching nomadic peoples such as the Hadza, Kyrgyzs, and Mongols.
As an aside here, it shocks me how quickly I come to learn new things about our world that are directly applicable to worldbuilding. Before today I'd never heard the terms ambi-, bi-, matri-, and patri-locality as terms for where newly married couples typically live.

Fresh Air

Well it's been pretty cold here, so I've not literally gone outside. I did take some downtime to play board and video games, talk to other Anvilites on Discord, and write some code not related to anything I'm presently doing on WA.
And so this wraps up my World Ember 2024 Homework. I'm as ready as I'm going to be. **Deep Breath.**

Best of luck to everyone!