Worldbuilding Tropes to Ward Off With a Stick (Guest Post by R's Loft!)
For this Monday, Rachel of R's Loft and I decided to exchange blog posts! Fun, right? I've never had a guest post on this blog before, so this is super exciting for me. My post is over on Rachel's blog, and it's a post full of things in books that make me stupidly happy. You should go check it out, but not before you read this fabulous tropes-busting post from Rachel!
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You know what's annoying? Tropes that won't go away, even after they've been beaten to death by the writers of the world. That's why today we're going to be talking about tropes that you should ward off with a large stick while backing away slowly and keeping your manuscript safe behind you. Specifically the ones related to fantasy and science fiction worldbuilding, because they're pretty similar. Prepare the bullet point lists!
Fantasy Worldbuilding
• Medieval Europe. For years the medieval times have been the basis of worldbuilding for many a budding writer. However, it's old. It's boring. Give us something fresh, people. Japanese inspired fantasy? Australian? Brazil?
• Only swords, bows, and arrows. There are a ton of weapons out in the world, and yet these are the top ones. And only small bows and swords. What about rapiers or claymores? Bows as big as you? And let's not forget about spears, maces, war hammers, staffs, blow darts, shields, and axes.
• Fantasy starter pack. Bethany has talked about this before, but I'll repeat it. You need more than a fantasy starter pack with humans, elves, and dwarves for your novel. There are whole lists of fantasy creatures out there, so use them. Give us some originality.
• Repeat of (insert favorite fantasy world here). Whether it's the world of Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings, someone has probably copied it. That's one of the sloppiest types of worldbuilding in my book. Sure, take inspiration from said world if you want. But don't clone it and change a tiny little thing to say that it's different.
• Keyboard smash names. You know, those long ones with no vowels, two apostrophes, and the Batman symbol. If I can't spell the name without looking at the book six times or I have to sound it out like a little kid, then chances are I won't remember the name later. It's okay to create your own names, but make them easy to say, please.
• Monarchies. Did you know there are almost no true monarchies left in the world? The United States started a thing when we revolted against England and now Democracies are huge. It would be great if we saw some more of that mirrored in our fantasy worlds, wouldn't it?
Sci-Fi Worldbuilding
• Humanoid aliens. All aliens look like us, but with bigger eyes or longer legs or a different skin color. Have you noticed that? Why don't we invent more obscure aliens, like dog like ones that are physicists or giant ones with horns that eat planets? I don't know, think of something.
• Evil empires. Star Wars may have started this trend, but now evil empires that are absolute evil but completely rule the galaxy are everywhere. And of course, with the evil empire comes the heroic rebellion who is much smaller but more determined to bring peace and order. Try something new for a change.
• One biome planets. An ice planet. A tropic planet. A stormy water planet. Again, it came from Star Wars (which I am not in any way dissing), but it can stop there. Just look at our world. A mass of different climates and ecosystems. I know it's difficult to create something like that, but even if you add just a bit more depth to your planets it would be nice.
• Advanced aliens. All the aliens humans encounter are light years ahead of us in advancement. We are practically dogs compared to their brilliance. Why can't humans ever find an alien species much less advanced than us? That's one thing I love about Star Trek, is that they find all sorts of civilizations.
• Humans are bad. Aliens, of course, are enlightened alien-tree huggers that are here to stop humans from destroying themselves and their planet. Why do the humans always have to be bad and the aliens good or the aliens bad and humans good? Shouldn't they be mixed, like real people?
• Unrealistic space warfare. Just watch a few Because Science videos to see what I mean. Explosions, laser cannons, up and down. Fighting in space would be extremely different and people need to remember that.
• Oh look, humanity destroyed the Earth. Bring on the natural disasters and fleeing to the stars. Wouldn't it be nice to have a book where humanity fixed Earth instead?
Obviously, you could always take any of these tropes and make them new and unique. Or maybe you really like them and want to use them, so go ahead. They would also be great for a satire novel.
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