Building Realities Core
Factions
Hey everybody, today I’m just going to talk a little about factions. Factions aren’t necessary for worldbuilding, and may exist without having more than a name. Factions aren’t necessary often a good way to introduce motivations, goals, new characters or concepts, and much more.
This article is one of many that will be available in a set later, as a book, or just an insert with things like templates. Each article covers topics that worlds are often built around. If your setting is used for more than a single story, small or large, factions can be a good way to show continuity and progress.
Factions are like countries. Or peewee soccer teams. 😀
Yes, factions can consist of any kind of character grouping, really. Those most important to consider are devoted to control(governments, armies), certain specifics, like Guilds in tons of settings, they may or may not interact, or rely on each other. Factions are also level dependent, by which I mean, the British Navy, as a whole, is unlikely to be concerned with the trainings and rankings of the London Junior Cricket League. If a faction is too large to have opposition that is on an equal level of impact, it may have Rebels, fighting against it. This could be a very large group, like a fully orchestrated civil war, or maybe it’s just the main character and other plot relevant characters that disagree with the large faction, or maybe just some of its ideas, and therefore seek to change through non-oppositional means(the way a group of civilians may come together in order to remove a law that is considered completely arbitrary outside of a school district).
Usually, belonging to a faction will have some requirements, however these vary even more than the reason of existence in general. A character will likely have to apply, meet criteria, pay dues, and maintain a particular standing with other groups that may be affiliated.
In exchange for meeting said requirements, factions may offer benefits like voting privilege, an allotment of group resources, items signifying membership, access to a type of job board related to a factions purpose, short term, and long term goals.
Articles in this series include:
Factions, Research, Magic, Economy, Roads, Races, Mercantile, and more!
In RPGs, there is often a guild for each class, like The Thieves Guild, Fighter’s Guild, and so on. I highly recommend using naming that is not so simple and broad. A player will often have to meet minimum requirements, pay a yearly fee, and not act against any other member, with violence, threats, generally anti aggression.
That’s it for now! See you next time!
Jack Lhasa
jlhasa.eth
reading this made me realize how many “factions” i’ve accidentally created in my own life/worlds without calling them that. like little groups that form around an idea or vibe and then somehow shape the whole story. kind of makes me want to go back and actually name them just to see what shifts.