MYTHS, LEGENDS, AND GODS - Terrible Writing Advice

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Good to see Terrible Writing Advice getting attention

šŸ‘ļøŽ︎ 20 šŸ‘¤ļøŽ︎ u/pikeandshot1618 šŸ“…ļøŽ︎ Aug 31 2019 šŸ—«︎ replies

Ah, another person of culture.

šŸ‘ļøŽ︎ 14 šŸ‘¤ļøŽ︎ u/[deleted] šŸ“…ļøŽ︎ Aug 31 2019 šŸ—«︎ replies

They have one literally on Worldbuilding cultures

šŸ‘ļøŽ︎ 6 šŸ‘¤ļøŽ︎ u/Dinaron šŸ“…ļøŽ︎ Aug 31 2019 šŸ—«︎ replies

I wish I could watch it

šŸ‘ļøŽ︎ 5 šŸ‘¤ļøŽ︎ u/Somaliboi šŸ“…ļøŽ︎ Aug 31 2019 šŸ—«︎ replies
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MYSTERIOUS FIGURE: This video is sponsored by Skillshare, but maybe it's not too late. In the beginning, for the first six days the author rested. Then on the seventh day he realized his deadline was upon him so he rushed the mythology of his world out the door before it was ready. Um... letā€™s just lasso ancient Greek and Norse mythology, change a few names then copy, and then paste! Wow. That was faster than you can say ā€œitā€™s not cultural appropriation when no members of that culture are left alive to sue meā€. Now that leaves me plenty of time to instruct other writers on how to construct their very own myths, legends, and entire pantheons of gods and goddesses for their own writing projects. Now the thing that most writers need to consider about writing a constructed mythology for a story is that background information, or as most people call it these days ā€˜the loreā€™, can be thought of as a potent spice that is sprinkled onto the story to add flavor. And much like cayenne pepper, lore should just be heaped on, overpowering the whole thing until it is just unpalatable to all but the most die hard lore junkies. The best way to start this process is by front loading the creation myth at the start of the story! A long-winded prologue about how the world came to be, whoā€™s who among the gods, and a how the storyā€™s macguffin was forged will go great with the infodump of the worldā€™s history in chapter 2. Who is telling this prologue creation myth? Why the author of course. No reason to have a creation myth told by an in universe character, allowing that characterā€™s unique perspective color the story. Nor should an author considering compacting that myth into a short poem or phrase that can be use as a reoccurring motif. Does the creation myth need to be in the prologue or in the story at all? What purpose does it serve? Well the purpose is that I think itā€™s cool therefore it goes in the story. Not include my precious creation myth? Why donā€™t I just murder my darlings while Iā€™m at it, you monster! This bit of world building is like my baby. I could never just, eh Iā€™m bored now. Ooh. I wanna add some gods and goddesses to my story! But I canā€™t decide what my gods and goddesses should be like. Thankfully Terrible Writing Advice has provided all writers with this handy list of commonly used templates. The God of War, Battle, and mentioning honor every other word. Odds are he will look like a Greek hoplite even if in a fantasy world devoid of ancient Greeks. Common weapons include a spear, sword, or axe. If the classic Greek look doesnā€™t suit your taste, then this template can also sport a standard issue Dark Lord armor set. Medium odds of being the storyā€™s antagonist especially if no god of evil or death is around. The Goddess of fertility, birth, cultivation, and ladiness. Mentioned offhand in the story, but never given much focus because her dominion doesnā€™t involve stabbing people with magic weapons or other things most writers consider cool. However, if the settingā€™s deities grant magic powers, her bestowed magic would be absolutely game breaking in terms of usefulness and utility to an ancient or medieval society and would have far reaching military applications that I will, of course, completely ignore. The god of fire, forges, cool magical weapons, and macguffin creation. Macguffin screwing up the world? Well this is the guy to blame. Donā€™t complain too much though because he will also make the chosen oneā€™s anti-dark lord sword. Even in fantasy there is no escaping the military industrial complex. The god of death, decay, evil, demons, and dark color palettes with an optional side of necromancy. If not outright the storyā€™s main antagonist then expect him to at least be worshiped by bad guys. This god being evil is essential so I can lump all of the aspects of nature I donā€™t like onto him so my nature god or goddess can be good. Routinely abuses and sacrifices his own followers, betrays everyone he enters a deal with, and will bring about the destruction of the universe should he ever win so naturally anyone can see why scores of cults flock to worship him. I mean they so much get out of it. Despite being a god of chaos and destruction he is sure good at creating the logistics and infrastructure needed to maintained his highly advanced and organized empire and military forces. Same as the previous entry, but a goddess instead and with both seduction and corruption as an added domain of influence. Always has dark hair, copious amounts of cleavage. Will 100% want the hero for herself, but thankfully the hero is immune to her godly charisma, supernatural attractiveness, far more interesting personality, and plethora of interesting story possibilities to instead choose the far more conventional love interest the story has saddled him with. The god of a single element and one other random trait to make them stand out a little more. Usually come in clusters to represent various classical elements with maybe a few extras like light, dark, life, death, or some other more esoteric ā€˜elementā€™. We canā€™t have the gods of hydrogen or chlorine wandering about because a pantheon of the periodic table of elements would be way too big. The trickster god of pranks, trolling, and advancing the plot when things get too stale. Even if the gods are never characters in the story, expect the trickster god to still nudge things along. High odds of ending up on the team good guy eventually even if their initial loyalty is in question. The nature god that is basically a giant tree and not like a billion other things found in nature. Sometimes alternatively represented as an older, motherly woman. Nature gods and goddesses tend to emphasize the good parts of nature like sunshine, trees, running streams, and other such things found on a park brochures and not the less savory aspects of nature like storms, disease, and parasitic wasps that instead fall under the domain of the god of evil. The god of magic that has the essential role of allowing magic to exist. Otherwise this god has no discernible personality, motive, or anything else and is there solely for the setting to justify its magic powers. When pressed for more details a writer can just say the god of magic looks like Odin. The god of justice who exists mostly so the Dungeon Master has a justification to take away the paladinā€™s powers when the player role-playing him gets too uppity. Now the important thing to remember when filling out one or more pantheons is to just create the gods, not flesh out the worldā€™s major religions that would be built around them. The ceremonies and rituals that make up much of a cultureā€™s daily routine and allow a people to contextualize the world around them by viewing it through a religious lens is not needed when we have an entire pantheon of Mary Sues at our disposal. Competing pantheons of wildly different styles of gods being used to generate conflict? A complex web of animistic spirits that make up a spiritual ecosystem? Competing religious perspectives among characters to add another layer of conflict? Thoughtful critique of organized religion through a fantasy setting so an author doesnā€™t have to offend real world religious readers? I mean we could do those, or we put three of the gods into a love triangle,... or two,... or three, not counting all of the mortals they are wooing on the side. The point isnā€™t to add depth to the worldbuilding, but to add in a bunch of cool god characters that take over the story and turn the previously established cast of mortals into glorified background extras. Well that, and also so the characters can use setting specific swear words. By Thorā€™s hangnail is that fun to do. And just like real life curse words, they should be strung together and used so often that they loose all meaning, start to become unintentionally funny, or eventually fade into annoying background noise. Speaking of background noise, a settingā€™s legends can be safely reduced down to the level of a simple plot hook for a fetch quest. Many have searched for the legendary Lore Stones whose magical properties are so mysterious and infamous that the characters have just now heard of them halfway through the story. The Lore Stones, umā€¦ letā€™s see. Theyā€¦ Uh. I got it! The Lore Stones hold the secret to magic itself. As it turns out, the dark secret of magic Iā€™ve alluded to since chapter one will be revealed now! What is the secret nature of the settingā€™s magic? Aliens did it I guess with like science stuff or whatever. Hey look, the mystery box already did its job with marketing. Itā€™s way too hard to actually put something cool in it. Deities and myths for a setting should always be carelessly thrown in based on the authorā€™s capricious whims, and never used to explore and reflect the settingā€™s cultural ideals or values. Nor should the settingā€™s myths and legends be used to reinforce the theme of a work or prop up a central design pillar of the worldbuilding. The settingā€™s lore need not earn its place within the narrative, rather the narrative should bend to the will of the lore. Think of the settingā€™s lore as a baseball bat that can be used to mercilessly beat new audience members with until they finally give up and go enjoy a work that doesnā€™t have an impenetrable shell of proper nouns to stop them from getting into the story. At least until someone invents a ā€˜skip loreā€™ button. DARK LORD: Who is that again? Itā€™s getting increasing difficult to keep track of all the pitiful worms at my feet. KNIGHT COMMANDER: We are the knights of artistic integrity and we have come to stop you from selling out! CEO: Whatā€™s this integrity thing and how much can you sell it for? CONSPIRATOR: I already warned you about these weirdos when they tried to kill me a few videos back. And what absurd costumes. You look like a renaissance fair got raided by anarcho-communists. IMPERIAL TROOPER: Says the guy dressed in a hood and cloak. KNIGHT COMMANDER: Listen! You must stop shilling or else the Terrible Writing Advice expanded universe will end! DARK LORD: Wait, I thought it was the cinematic universe? CONSPIRATOR: There he goes again. What on earth are you talking about? KNIGHT COMMANDER: Itā€™s all about ads! Ads will destroy the universe. CONSPIRATOR: Come again? KNIGHT COMMANDER: Ads man! Ads. Advertisements have destroyed countless civilizations. Bronze age collapse? That was all ads. Fall of the Roman Empire? Barbarians got ads that told them to sack Rome. Titanic? People got on the doomed ship because of ads. The bubonic plague. Actually Iā€™m not sure about that one, but Iā€™m pretty sure ads had something to do it. Ads even invented capitalism so they can propagate. And now ads threaten the entire Terrible Writing Advice universe. DARK LORD: Oh great. I know an oncoming info dump when I see one. KNIGHT COMMANDER: You see, uncounted eons ago when the universe was still young, ancient forces beyond comprehension formed this videoā€™s sponsor Skillshare! The ancient ones gathered over 25,000 classes in writing, design, technology and more then keyed them to a powerful premium membership to grant unlimited access to that forbidden knowledge and Skillshareā€™s online community. Classes that contain dark forbidden knowledge like this class on poster design that was obviously made by ads to spread their sinister agenda. Those who quest for the link can unlock two months of Skillshare for free by going to skl.sh/twa12 or clicking on the link in the description below which will doom us all! And this but one of many! Those who gain enough sponsors can acquire nearly unlimited power! But the prophecy stats that hey, where did they all go. CULTIST: Oh. They all took the sponsor and ran off the moment you mentioned unlimited power. KNIGHT COMMANDER: No! Iā€™m too late! The sponsorship warsā€¦ have begun!
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Channel: Terrible Writing Advice
Views: 550,403
Rating: 4.9716473 out of 5
Keywords: Terrible Writing Advice, writing, Bad advice, Novel, Novel writing, Writing a book, book, J.P. Beaubien, J.P.Beaubien, Terrible, JPBeaubien, JP Beaubien, constructed mythologies, fantasy pantheons, writing myths, writing legends, writing mythology
Id: 22E82Q1dLSY
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 11min 53sec (713 seconds)
Published: Sat Aug 10 2019
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