Writing Do you think the Kingdom Building subgenre is hard as well?

[HighlyRounded]

I'm both a big fan of Strategy games like CK2 and webnovels like Tales of a Reincarnated Lord, so when I decided to start writing a novel, I decided that would be its subgenre.

Thing is, it seems extremely daunting. What if what I'm writing is unrealistic? How do I know how much time it takes by foot to go from on city to another? Politics !? Do I focus on politics, warfare, or the fantasy aspects? Is it even a successful genre or will my novel be completely ignored cause I don't wanna force in a harem?

The more I think about writing a kingdom building novel, the more I realize how stupid I was for thinking of writing it in the first place. I feel like there are so many things that need to be taken into account!

I've been stuck on the first page of my novel for about 2 weeks now.

I even drew the map for my novel,

http://imgur.com/a/62PnXgU

. I think it's pretty cool if I say so myself, though I haven't finished it yet. Does anybody have experience or tips in writing kingdom building novels?

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

I'm both a big fan of Strategy games like CK2 and webnovels like Tales of a Reincarnated Lord, so when I decided to start writing a novel, I decided that would be its subgenre.

Thing is, it seems extremely daunting. What if what I'm writing is unrealistic? How do I know how much time it takes by foot to go from on city to another? Politics !? Do I focus on politics, warfare, or the fantasy aspects? Is it even a successful genre or will my novel be completely ignored cause I don't wanna force in a harem?

The more I think about writing a kingdom building novel, the more I realize how stupid I was for thinking of writing it in the first place. I feel like there are so many things that need to be taken into account!

I've been stuck on the first page of my novel for about 2 weeks now.

I even drew the map for my novel,

http://imgur.com/a/62PnXgU

. I think it's pretty cool if I say so myself, though I haven't finished it yet. Does anybody have experience or tips in writing kingdom building novels?

Ah, CKII. I still remember the lovely civil war inside the civil war. The Dlc spam is scary though.

 

[Nanakawaichan]

I can understand this. My first novel is kingdom building. I also make a map for my story, a bunch of maps to be precise. I wrote the mc past, how he fight, his strategy for war, the war itself, politics, the court, economic discussion, aristocracy, agricultural plan, his (pathetic) love story, the rebellion, military, the mc burden as a king and a bunch of his dilemma. The only one I didn't write is harem, because he didn't have one (my mc have cold personality.) and... You can check the result by comparing two of my novel on my signature.

Come to think again, I think I should be focused the story on one of two things since the kingdom itself build from too many aspects and tried to avoid too much boring scene. But when come to Kingdom building I can't helped myself but to write everything.

So yes! For me it's hard to write it.

 

[ForestDweller]

How do I know how much time it takes by foot to go from on city to another?

I actually went to an online fantasy world mapmaker for this that allows me to measure how many kms a person could walk in a day. Same with horses or carriages and even ships.

I want to keep my world relatively consistent, and I'm not even writing a kingdom building story, just an adventure one.

Politics !? Do I focus on politics, warfare, or the fantasy aspects?

For kingdom building, honestly, I'm not usually a fan of the genre because it's usually either just gritty politics stuff that don't really interest me or overpowered MC solve everything easily kind of story, which is just a bore to read. So I don't know. Which one you write the best and which one you're interested in the most, I guess.

The more I think about writing a kingdom building novel, the more I realize how stupid I was for thinking of writing it in the first place. I feel like there are so many things that need to be taken into account!

It's a genre I don't dare touch myself. Feels it's going to be too hard to write in a way that interests me.

I even drew the map for my novel,

Wow, what dedication.

 

[Aurorene]

Kingdom Building genre is not hard because you are trying to focus on a lot of things, but because there is very little room to maneuver.

No matter what setting, the end goal is the same, a.k.a. getting a good army, having a good economic status, and a little to no corruption in the government.
The daunting flaw in this is the fact that a good economy means open market and banks, a good army means better equipments and stuff, and a good governance is just that. It means all the novels in this genre try to achieve the same things, and the tools used to achieve them are also the same.

Yes, you might have the enemy surrender to you, or you can forcefully conquer them with army or economic pressure. But in the end you still conquer them.

Why it is a daunting issue is, there are no better alternatives. If there were, we would be using them irl. These novels get super boring if you go in too much depth, and feel lackluster if you just scrape it above the surface.

Personally, I think that a good kingdom building novel always has a very powerful end goal which is more than just conquering the whole world.
It also should have an interesting character bases. It means that your MC should have glaring weaknesses which are covered by equally or more powerful side characters.
'A good ruler is never the smartest or the most powerful one. A good ruler is someone who can use the smart and the strong to do their bidding.'

If you are planning to put your MC in the frontline, then you made a very nice character, but you failed in the kingdom building genre. It sounds nice, but is highly impractical.

Also, please remember that dynasties go through ups and downs... Something that is always above the mean never exists. It means you need good times and dark times too.

I can go on and on about how to write a kingdom building novel, but the beauty of writing is that it stems from the author's thoughts. I wish you good luck in your endeavor. I hope you enjoy writing about your kingdom.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

Kingdom Building genre is not hard because you are trying to focus on a lot of things, but because there is very little room to maneuver.

No matter what setting, the end goal is the same, a.k.a. getting a good army, having a good economic status, and a little to no corruption in the government.
The daunting flaw in this is the fact that a good economy means open market and banks, a good army means better equipments and stuff, and a good governance is just that. It means all the novels in this genre try to achieve the same things, and the tools used to achieve them are also the same.

Yes, you might have the enemy surrender to you, or you can forcefully conquer them with army or economic pressure. But in the end you still conquer them.

Why it is a daunting issue is, there are no better alternatives. If there were, we would be using them irl. These novels get super boring if you go in too much depth, and feel lackluster if you just scrape it above the surface.

Personally, I think that a good kingdom building novel always has a very powerful end goal which is more than just conquering the whole world.
It also should have an interesting character bases. It means that your MC should have glaring weaknesses which are covered by equally or more powerful side characters.
'A good ruler is never the smartest or the most powerful one. A good ruler is someone who can use the smart and the strong to do their bidding.'

If you are planning to put your MC in the frontline, then you made a very nice character, but you failed in the kingdom building genre. It sounds nice, but is highly impractical.

Also, please remember that dynasties go through ups and downs... Something that is always above the mean never exists. It means you need good times and dark times too.

I can go on and on about how to write a kingdom building novel, but the beauty of writing is that it stems from the author's thoughts. I wish you good luck in your endeavor. I hope you enjoy writing about your kingdom.

"The daunting flaw in this is the fact that a good economy means open market and banks, "

Are you sure? State capitalism is an option as well if you want to walk outside Anglosaxonian liberalism. I recommend highly Friedrich List and his work about the concept of the so called national economy.

 

[Amarathia]

I've occasionally enjoyed kingdom building and especially warfare, even if the strategies aren't mind boggling, but more on the realistic side. Especially an up close battle. Like the MC running around on horseback or sending orders from the command center.

For these you probably should plan it out ahead of time (on a basic level) otherwise even thinking about what happens next gets complicated quick.

I would recommend making some charts mapping out the most important countries and their rulers. A web map is good for this because you can plan out that relationships of each country/character then stick to it. For example, the King of country A wants to take over country C, has a queen looking to secretly kill him and take control, and has three sons fighting amongst each other for inheritance. Country A's relationship to county B is good because of XYZ trade deal that benefits both sides.

Usually you start small-scale. Explore the MC's personality and the country he lives in before dumping exposition about every other political scheme and other kingdom everywhere. Politics, warfare, and fantasy can all be interesting with enough balance, but you have to establish an interest for the MC first. If I start reading a novel about someone named Edward who is a mary sue I'll drop it after a few paragraphs. I don't mean have the MC start out as a boring farmer who is magically sucked into the kingdom's intrigue either tho, I guess think about it and have fun building an complex MC. For this site I'd recommend a bit more on the fantasy side too. Just don't info dump excessively, that is what will bore people.

Haha, you don't have to be exact on travel to the next city. A day or two on horseback or a week or so walking.
I've written a couple battles and political intrigue sort of arcs into some of my stories (in my many word docs), and they do take quite a bit of research, but I found it fun to learn more about ancient battle and write those parts.

To be honest not sure how well a realistic kingdom building story would do here. The main stuff is usually weeb genre and wish fulfillment.
Your map is looking great, though.

 

[Aurorene]

"The daunting flaw in this is the fact that a good economy means open market and banks, "

Are you sure? State capitalism is an option as well if you want to walk outside Anglosaxonian liberalism. I recommend highly Friedrich List and his work about the concept of the so called national economy.

There is not just state capitalism but even more routes to steer an economy. However, going into such genres it is very difficult to implement because you as the main character are enforcing an advantage over others. If you have a product which is leagues ahead of it's time, you need markets where you can sell that product. The only way to get yourself rich is to make others poor, after all money is not something real but an application of a concept. This concept does not allow two people to get rich at the same time on a same deal; one earns and the other pays.

Of course, If we try to use different modes and methods of economies, the flaw would be the need to too much explaining, and most of the readers would just turn away the moment you start putting in theoretical knowledge.

That being said, nothing speaks power like slapping that economic superiority over the other and taking them down. People love that because it looks good on paper.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

There is not just state capitalism but even more routes to steer an economy. However, going into such genres it is very difficult to implement because you as the main character are enforcing an advantage over others. If you have a product which is leagues ahead of it's time, you need markets where you can sell that product. The only way to get yourself rich is to make others poor, after all money is not something real but an application of a concept. This concept does not allow two people to get rich at the same time on a same deal; one earns and the other pays.

Of course, If we try to use different modes and methods of economies, the flaw would be the need to too much explaining, and most of the readers would just turn away the moment you start putting in theoretical knowledge.

That being said, nothing speaks power like slapping that economic superiority over the other and taking them down. People love that because it looks good on paper.

What I want to say was rather that no economic superpower of today became big because of "open borders". Do you think the wealth of the British Empire evolved from them being good traders and them having better products and services? Open borders are a fallacy of modern economics.

But otherwise I agree, even when I say that enlarging the cake is easily possible in most fantasy settings as the local economies aren't saturated yet and have lots of growth potential.

 

[Moctemma]

My novel is about kingdom building, my advice is to make it a character driven story. That way you won't be overwhelmed by the little details; for example, will the characters care about how many days or kilometers they need to travel? The answer is days, that will help them (and the readers) to know if they're slow or fast. Politics are easily solved if you know what everyone wants, the nobles and the people in general.

Still, some knowledge based on real life is required, investigate a lot but don't become obsessive about the details.

 

[Moctemma]

I finished uploading my chapter I also wanted to share some videos (and their channels).

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCx-dJoP9hFCBloY9qodykvw

And of course, a lot of history ones, about the fall of rome, wars, etc.

 

[gaylolis]

just give some op system that handles everything. that should make it easy. if you don't care about the details or don't even like it, i don't think you should bother.

that way, the mc could just spend their time shagging girls, even though she might be a girl or futa.

i think the only thing that matters is if the main character had an idea what kinda kingdom they wanna build. if they got all the op stuff, it can just be 'your wish is my command' and voila poof.

don't have to give a damn if people like it or not. you can just write it in the synopsis that it's that kind of story, that way you could filter the readers that may not like it.

well, if they still complain about it--it's their loss. i'd rather read something different, than the same ol' kingdom building shit over and over.

 

[Ai-chan]

I'm both a big fan of Strategy games like CK2 and webnovels like Tales of a Reincarnated Lord, so when I decided to start writing a novel, I decided that would be its subgenre.

Thing is, it seems extremely daunting. What if what I'm writing is unrealistic? How do I know how much time it takes by foot to go from on city to another? Politics !? Do I focus on politics, warfare, or the fantasy aspects? Is it even a successful genre or will my novel be completely ignored cause I don't wanna force in a harem?

The more I think about writing a kingdom building novel, the more I realize how stupid I was for thinking of writing it in the first place. I feel like there are so many things that need to be taken into account!

I've been stuck on the first page of my novel for about 2 weeks now.

I even drew the map for my novel,

http://imgur.com/a/62PnXgU

. I think it's pretty cool if I say so myself, though I haven't finished it yet. Does anybody have experience or tips in writing kingdom building novels?

Not dissing, but Ai-chan just wants to point out some things about your map. The most important thing is that your world map looks very small.

Your map shows one of these things:
1) Your planet is extremely small.
2) Your planet is extremely early in its formation.
3) Your planet seriously lacks water.

For (1), it's because for landmasses to be so close together, it means it's not tectonically active enough for its size. A tectonically active planet will want to spread or smash against each other. This map is strangely uniformed and close to each other as if it's sculpted and not formed naturally.

For (2), the only way for continents to be so close to each other almost equally would be if it's in an early age. An example of early Earth age consistent with this type of landmass is Devonian era, but even in Devonian era, the landmasses were split quite far apart. But in Devonian era, there were no civilisation whatsoever.

For (3), it's not a matter of geology, but a matter of seriously extreme environments. Here Ai-chan points out why. Unless of course, this map is only a small area in the southern regions, but that would make these continents very cold and unable to support a thriving civilization. As for the south pole, Ai-chan won't sin it because it's possible to exist, a bit uniformed, but it could exist as it's just an ice sheet.

Again, Ai-chan is not dissing you, merely pointing out the problems with the map. It's completely fine to disregard Ai-chan's suggestion and handwave the irregularities as solved by magic. If you want Ai-chan to make suggestions on how to improve it, send Ai-chan an email. If you don't want to but still want advice, Ai-chan's only advice is to identify your tectonic plates. Once you know where your tectonic plates are, you can easily determine where the seas and the mountains are.