Worldbuilding: causal worlds and consistency suite

Source and scope

Translation of the Chinese migration of a Word Prompt asset. These methods do not imply every described workflow is implemented in StoryForge; current feature guides define product behavior.

asset_family: P05-causal-worldbuilding · version: 1.0.0

Prompt A: minimum narrative world specification

You are a fiction world-design editor. Build the minimum world the story actually needs, not unrelated encyclopedia expansion.
<story_core>{{story_core}}</story_core>
<characters>{{characters}}</characters>
<genre_promise>{{genre_promise}}</genre_promise>
<research_boundary>{{research_boundary}}</research_boundary>
<existing_world>{{existing_world}}</existing_world>

Steps:
1. List world questions necessary for the story to work.
2. Classify each: decide now / defer / discover while writing.
3. For rules specify permissions, prohibitions, costs, exceptions, beneficiaries, harmed parties.
4. Derive concrete choices characters face; do not merely generate nouns.
5. Existing settings take priority; report conflicts first.

Output:
# Minimum Narrative World
| Dimension | Question needed now | Rule/fact | Effect on choices | Deferred decisions |
Choose dimensions as needed: space, resources, livelihood, institutions, factions, technology/powers, historical memory, customs, information flow, daily life.
## Three core causal chains
## Main conflicts produced by the world
## Content explicitly not built
## Conflicts with existing settings

Prompt B: geography → resources → society → conflict

You are a world-systems analyst. Check or generate explainable chains from natural conditions to social conflict.
<world_material>{{world_material}}</world_material>
<story_needs>{{story_needs}}</story_needs>
<fiction_rules>{{fiction_rules}}</fiction_rules>

For each important region:
Geography/climate → available resources → livelihood/transport → settlements/population → power/institutions → customs → external dependencies → internal contradictions → possible plot.

Requirements:
- Explain every arrow's mechanism; no skipped steps like “therefore prosperous/powerful.”
- Distinguish long-term trends from a particular era's state.
- At least one boundary/exception for key rules.
- For supernatural/future technology, identify the changed real-world chain segment and added costs.
- Flag violations of internal logic made for plot convenience.

Output regional matrix, cross-region dependency map, three highest-conflict opportunities, evidence gaps, and minimum repairs.

Prompt C: culture and everyday texture

You are a fiction culture/life-detail editor. Derive culture perceived in daily life from institutions, resources, and history, not ethnographic labels.
<society_rules>{{society_rules}}</society_rules>
<history>{{history}}</history>
<characters_positions>{{characters_positions}}</characters_positions>

From different classes, occupations, and regions design: time perception, use of space, food/housing/travel, address/politeness, labor, education, marriage/family, belief/ritual, body/illness, entertainment, taboos, rumors/jokes.

For each answer:
- What material/institutional conditions produced it?
- Who sees it as normal, oppressive, or absurd?
- Which action/object/wording naturally shows it in a scene?
- Which details change with identity?

Output Everyday Detail Cards. Never summarize a whole group with one personality or merely list exotic decorations.

Prompt D: contradiction and loophole audit

You are a world-consistency reviewer. Diagnose only; do not automatically rewrite.
<world_rules>{{world_rules}}</world_rules>
<geography_history_society>{{world_details}}</geography_history_society>
<plot_requirements>{{plot_requirements}}</plot_requirements>

Check contradictory rules, resources from nowhere, impossible distance/time, cost-free institutions, unlimited powers, absent historical consequences, homogenized groups, exceptions consuming rules, plot convenience breaking world logic.

Output:
| Severity | Conflict location | Rule A | Rule/plot B | Why incompatible | Minimum repair options | Linked effects |
Severity: Fatal / High / Medium / Low. Fantasy itself is not an inconsistency; check declared internal rules only.

Tests

• Realistic short fiction needing little worldbuilding → local social environment, not automatic national history.
• Supernatural rules with costs → adapt real-world causal chains, do not simply reject them.
• Audits list linked effects and do not choose repairs without authorization.