World building – how do you even get started? How do you world build? There are a few ways to world build. World building usually begins either top down – at the highest level of creation, or bottom up starting with a simple idea, as well as having core components. These components include things like culture, religion, magic, law, government, geography, etc.

While we’ll briefly explain the top down and bottom up approaches to world building, we’ll talk about how to get started, core elements to consider, and the most important core elements when starting out.

What is the top down approach to world building?

Imagine you’re a god, and you want to build a world. Right now, there’s nothing, so you create the world, then its continents and water mass. The top down approach to world building starts at the highest level and drills down into the details.

Benefits to the top down world building approach include:

1. You have the lay of the land ahead of time – How many suns and moons does your world have? Are there any suns and moons? How many oceans, the geography, etc.
2. Using this method gives you a structure for further development – If you’re really getting into world building, the larger elements help define the smaller elements. For example, what impact would two moons have on the tides? How would two moons impact seasonality and therefore your calendars?
3. This method might be the best approach depending on your reason for world building – Why you’re world building can really determine which approach to take. If you’re world building is more character driven, it might be too time-consuming to start at the top. However, if you’re world building for actionable stuff, like board game design or making maps, this is going to be a great approach.

What is the bottom up approach to world building?

Now, imagine you’re a god who hasn’t quite dreamt up a world, but has a character in mind, or a war in mind. The bottom up approach to world building starts at the lower levels and builds up. So you might have a character or a series of characters, and that leads you to having a village, or a house at the very least. Later, there is an obstacle, perhaps an opposing realm. As your people move within the world, you start to build your world up.

The bottom up approach doesn’t necessarily have to start with a person. It could start with a religion, or a war, or an event. Ultimate, it starts with an idea that’s at the lower rung of your world, and you build up and out form there.

Benefits to the bottom up world building approach include:

1. You get to create actionable details first – With the bottom up, you’re starting with some idea that progresses. Usually this idea will have to move due to some obstacle. This means that you get to start to build out elements that lead to action in your world.
2. You don’t have to build everything with this approach – Because you’re world progresses from some idea, you only have to build what you need as you need it. This can be a great time-saver.
3. This method might be the best approach depending on your reason for world building – This one might sound repetitive, but it’s true. Your reason for world building will best determine whether this is the best approach. If you’re world building because you’re writing a character driven story, then this is going to be the best method to take.

How do you get started world building?

If you’re contemplating this question, then in a sense, you have already started the process. Now you’re wanting to know where to take it – how do I actually build a world? What information do I need?

To get started world building, consider why you want to build a world in the first place. Are you creating a game? Are you writing a story? Are you creating a map for a quest? The answer is going to point you into the right direction.

Say you’re writing a book that is character driven, then you want to consider world building using the bottom up approach. Now that you know that, what does your character need in order to fulfill what they must?

You can either plot this out, mind-mapping all of the things that move your character. Or, you could simply begin writing it out, and think about these things as it comes up.

If, however, you’re creating a game that is about conquest and territory acquisition, you might want to world build using the top down approach. This will help you map out the territories, the geography, the distance from one place to another. Then you can drill down as needed. Who is doing the conquering? Why are they doing it? Does it even matter?

Rather than mind-mapping, you might want to use the who, what, when, where, how, why approach to begin initially organizing your thoughts.

And likely, if you’re using the top-down approach to accomplish a specific goal, you probably will want more structure. Outlining and keeping track of the components in your world might be more necessary.

What are the core components of world building?

When you start researching questions about world building, you’ll start to see common themes. These start to show you some of the core components of world building. To make it easier, we’ve listed several components. This list is a great too to help you think about areas you want to develop your world.

List of World Building Core Components

1. Planetary/setting – This would include your world, the suns and moons, biomes, natural disasters, oceans, continents, seasonality
2. Maps and geography – You’ve got your setting, now map out the rivers, fortification locations, city placement, terrain, etc.
3. Language – Even if you’re not developing your own constructed language (conlang), you might have sayings and idioms within your world.
4. Naming – Naming is a great struggle for world builders, but it’s crucial. Not only are you naming people, but you’ve got places, things, regions, rivers, castles, ships – everything in your world needs a name. Because naming is a major struggle, we have a really helpful guide to naming that makes the process logical and easy.
5. Culture – This would include your holidays, traditions, mythology, legends…
6. History – You could easily go into a lot of detail with history – wars, monarchs, quests, conquests, discoveries, and so on.
7. Trade/Economy – Primarily, this would be the establishment of your currencies. But it can also dive into economic systems, guilds, trade routes (which starts to connect to maps)…
8. Religion – Religious systems, organization, what your churches are called, holy wars (which connects to history), religious practice, holidays (which connects to culture).
9. Magic Systems – Magic is a big part of world building. As you develop your magic systems, you’ll start to see it connect with the other core components.
10. Politics and Law – How is your world governed? What does crime and punishment look like? These are the types of categories within this core component.
11. Technology/Weapons/Transportation – Technology is going to be a bigger core component for sci fi world builders. But that’s not to say fantasy world builders can’t expand upon weapons and transportation developments.
12. Architecture – How are your castles structured? What about churches? Even small details like how your crude living structures are designed vs. the layout of rich manor houses would fall under this core component.
13. Races – Whether a sci-fi or fantasy world builder, you’re likely going to develop different races.
14. Animals/Organisms – What animals are domesticated? What is your livestock? What are your predators. As you develop these things, you’ll start to connect them to geography and setting.

What core components are essential when starting out with world building?

For most world builders, the most bare-bones, stripped down essential core components, especially for a bottom up world building approach, are:

1. Setting
2. Naming
3. Culture
4. History
5. Race

These are the most basic components to get you started. Race, for instance, is mentioned because at the very least you need a person or people group. History is usually inherent to initial world building because there is an element of past, present and future. Culture will have a subtle role in world building – at the very least, it’s how your people behave and interact with each other. Naming because you’ll need to name things, and setting because you must have world for everything to take place.

What about the most essential core components for the top down world building approach?

1. Setting
2. Naming
3. Maps and geography
4. History
5. Organisms
6. Race

With the top down approach, you need just a few things to start out. Depending on how far you want to dive with your top-down approach, organisms and race give you a sense of what and who is on your world. History is mentioned because even here there will be a basic element of a past, present and future. Maps and geography will help you understand ocean setup, continents, terrain, distances, locations of different settings and biomes. Naming is crucial because you will be naming everything. And of course setting is absolutely essential because your world – well it needs a world.