IxWiki:Lore Theory

Lore is a description of elements of a fictional world.

Lore, as mentioned, is “descriptive” - the reader of lore should get a sense not only of what something is, but why it is important. This is the central defining element of what separates “good” lore from “bad” lore: not quality of writing, or formatting, or graphics, or anything else; “why I need to know this to understand this universe” is the central question that lore should answer. This is not to say every item of lore is required to be a universal truth; many lore items should be understood in a sort of chain. To understand this world, I need to understand this country; to understand this country, I need to understand its culture; to understand its culture, I need to understand this tradition; to understand this tradition, I need to understand this physical object within its society, and so on.

This guide will explore both the basic tenets of lore theory and development and how it should relate to the average IxWiki user.

Priority of lore

All lore should follow a basic priority hierarchy patterned after the basic so called “five Ws” - who, what, where, when, why. This hierarchy does not assign value, necessarily, to each category, but instead helps the formation of overall national ideas. “WHAT” is the most basic element of lore, usually reserved to describe the central concept or to build secondary and tertiary pages. “WHEN”, and “WHERE”, are the second level of lore. This gives nations some sort of contour, meaning, history, and outline from which a reader can understand the “how” of this country’s formation and current basis. This also includes, to some extent, a basic cultural outline of a nation. The top level of lore is “WHY”, which builds the connections between disparate concepts and gives every piece of lore developed context and meaning. The “WHY” of a country not only takes the form of examining the consciousness of the nation, it also ties everything together in a narrative sense. In a meta context, it also goes the furthest to answering the question examined in the introduction; “why is what I am reading important?”

“WHO”, or lore and pages which describe individual people, is an isolated category on its own within the priority hierarchy. In terms of being descriptive, it is similar to “WHEN” and “WHERE”, but can go two different directions. “WHO” can often be a relatively isolated page or article describing an individual, as noteworthy as they may be, that presents a relatively rote biography, and unfortunately many or most individual pages take this course. However, when done correctly, with consideration of the entire whole of the concept and taking “WHY” into account, pages with individuals reach their full potential. The “WHY” of a nation should be informing this person’s worldview, actions within their life, and in some senses what their life becomes should also speak to and further develop a national “WHY”. This is a difficult task to achieve, and accordingly the “WHO” stands alone as an enigmatic category.

Sources of lore

There are three general sources of lore.

• The Major Idea. The Major Idea is the preconceived idea that a user has at the time that they joined IxWiki. This is almost always the central concept of the country as well as any set piece side lore thought about before creating the country. This is the foundational step for every user, but also arguably the easiest of the lore to create. The Major Idea, in its form, can basically be summarized as an “elevator pitch”. The Major Idea will subsist a user for awhile as they establish their pages and get their bearings. It will eventually deplete and is not an infinite source of lore, although it can help to inform developed lore in its themes and concepts.
• The Read Idea. The Read Idea is objects, ideas, and concepts that the user has read about, heard about, or seen in the real world and has imported into the world in some form. This is not a bad thing. The Read Idea is often the refuge of a user with writer’s block and can help them move their writing forward, especially if they can find real world analogues to their country or things that might work with their country. The Read Idea is the most labor-intensive of the three sources in that, rather than ideas being generated, it requires the user to go seeking and reproducing something that already exists, remaking it in a lore friendly way.
• The Developed Idea. The Developed Idea is the “ideal” lore. It is lore that is developed partly or completely organically based only on existing lore (the Major Idea and possibly the Read Idea). By emerging out of lore, it is truly unique and original lore that greatly enhances or can even alter the Major Idea. The Developed Idea is the realm of experienced users and nearly always the “skill filter” through which new users fail. Developed Ideas are fundamentally iterative and are often the type of lore that “dawns” on a user while reviewing their own lore or “out of the blue”.

Basic structure on IxWiki

For the purposes of the IxWiki user, lore development occurs in two primary places: the main page and secondary pages, which includes all tertiary and sub pages.

The main page for every country should serve three purposes. Firstly, to the owner of that page and country, it should serve as the general statement of why their country is relevant, what sets it apart, what makes it “standard”, etc., and generally the page should justify its own existence within a lore and universe context. Secondly, also to the owner of the page, it should provide the general blueprint and outline around which all tertiary lore will function; the main page, by nature, is a helpful organizational tool which should be at the “center” of all lore. Thirdly, to the reader, the main page should provide an “in brief” summary of the concept of the nation in question, both in terms of the literal introductory paragraph which elucidates the main concept as well as all subsections below it which provide light expansion on that topic. To that end, the sections should do as good a job as any secondary page for tying together extraneous elements of the country - its geography, its economy, its politics - with its main concept.

While main pages serve as the central organizing point for lore, the real “meat” of what some people call deep lore will appear on secondary pages. Generally speaking, the highest level secondary pages will be split-off versions of the basic categories on the main page, including politics & government, history, and so on. In this way, the main page remains as the “hub” of all lore, the secondary category pages the “spokes”, and all tertiary lore on those pages and beyond as the actual “wheel”.

Types of secondary pages

There are three kinds of secondary pages.

• “Loadbearing Lore” - These are articles which a country needs for basic form and function. This takes the form of pages for public offices, major categorical pages, or other general major pages.
• “Iterative Lore” - These are pages that are developed “on the fly”, largely at the margins between pages. Pages relevant to one nation will inevitably present a similar ancillary concept or idea over and over, and as the idea is written more about it becomes more and more worthy of receiving its own, iterated page. Once developed, this makes the source material - those places where the lore is originally discussed - richer.
• “Hobbyist Lore” - These are pages primarily sourced from the “Read Idea” and are very specific objects, items, and things of that nature which are of specific interest to the user creating them. There is nothing wrong with this type of lore provided it is nestled within the right context.

Importance of linear development

Linear development in lore contexts means developing the larger and more important concepts such as the main page and loadbearing lore before building smaller, iterative or hobbyist pages. Linear development does not necessarily mean sequential completion of pages in a “full” lore context. Instead, it means that pages are methodically built in such a way that allows for the creation of new lore “radiating” off of it that can not only stand alone as secondary pages but also can later prove to be a source of enrichment of the original work. The most prominent example of this is a main page. A main page is never truly “complete”, but should be “finished” to the extent that each major category, while still tied to the main concept, is reasonably fleshed out and ready to be built upon in other pages.

Under this example, if a user were to finish the main page of their country “Taistia”, they would perhaps include in their culture section a description of unique cuisine. A subsequent “Cuisine of Taistia” article would include more specifics, which would then be imported back onto the main page to tie everything together nicely while providing more enriched specifics on the main page. From this basic, linear development position, we could see an example of the “Developed Idea” discussed above; the cuisine of Taistia would perhaps include a rare crop or fruit that would drive the country’s historic development and politics, thus creating an entirely new idea that was not present in the “Major Idea” concept.

When users do not develop in a linear way, it does a disservice to them, their underlying lore, and even the nonlinear lore they have created. It does a disservice to the user because they have misappropriated thoughts on specific objects and items that do not (yet) relate to a greater idea that will enrich their country. It does a disservice to their underlying lore inasmuch as it is not given attention. Finally, it does a disservice to the nonlinear lore because that item has no reason to exist because a lore foundation was not established for it, and it has no context. This violates the basic lore idea described in the opening, that lore is something which tells the user why it must exist to explain the greater concept. In this way, nonlinear lore is like a mountaintop with no mountain; not only does it not make logical sense, but a viewer will have no idea what it is they are looking at.