Brainstorming to make a few things fresh or at least make sense in context.

[ConansWitchBaby]

I've wondered for a long time how to give certain elements, prompts, formulas, tropes, etc. in stories a fresh spin. Especially after going into different writing forums/websites/groups and seeing the same argument that everything is over-used and unoriginal. Without putting in the effort of explaining what they even want.

The one that got me thinking was a conversation yesterday about the economics in worlds that have spawning loot. Usually in gamelit/litrpg type of stories with regular fantasy dungeon stories. The simple problem with this is the over-saturation of what we on Earth would call valuables.

There can be over complicated fix-arounds by establishing mining vs farming practicality with cost revenues for heavy kingdom-building type stories. Explaining how waste product is handled if it's a novel that gives raw resources like uncut gems as rewards. Or if they dissipate and for how long before that process is done. How items are smelted for the far too common rusted version of items. The industrial complex of breaking down unwanted junk rewards into bulk goods. How even regular people that don't go and farm for the spawning rewards have a plethora of simple everyday items for their use.

For more monster-based stories or action-focused with the limited time or unwanted bogging down of world-building there can be easier alternatives. Non-dimensional spawn points can be subject to attacks from subterranean creatures in enclosed spaces. A bigger threat than usual dungeon mobs as they are outside the governing forces that come from within those areas. Creating the scarcity of the spawned loot. Sporadic dungeons that can't be farmed effectively as they spawn randomly. Items and treasures can be bound to the original winner. An ethereal or fourth-dimensional system put in place that regulates the items.

How about magic v warriors?

We can look at how all magic iterations tend to have a limit. Simple solution is to not forget about it. Then apply it in a way similar to gun combat. Run out and run away. Different way is to make warriors easier to gain resistances as part of a feedback of having superior bodies. Take a look at history and see how throwing bodies at something tends to work out eventually.

I'll probably update this randomly.

No. I'm not procrastinating. I'm gathering inspiration...yeah.

 

[Ilikewaterkusa]

I've wondered for a long time how to give certain elements, prompts, formulas, tropes, etc. in stories a fresh spin. Especially after going into different writing forums/websites/groups and seeing the same argument that everything is over-used and unoriginal. Without putting in the effort of explaining what they even want.

The one that got me thinking was a conversation yesterday about the economics in worlds that have spawning loot. Usually in gamelit/litrpg type of stories with regular fantasy dungeon stories. The simple problem with this is the over-saturation of what we on Earth would call valuables.

There can be over complicated fix-arounds by establishing mining vs farming practicality with cost revenues for heavy kingdom-building type stories. Explaining how waste product is handled if it's a novel that gives raw resources like uncut gems as rewards. Or if they dissipate and for how long before that process is done. How items are smelted for the far too common rusted version of items. The industrial complex of breaking down unwanted junk rewards into bulk goods. How even regular people that don't go and farm for the spawning rewards have a plethora of simple everyday items for their use.

For more monster-based stories or action-focused with the limited time or unwanted bogging down of world-building there can be easier alternatives. Non-dimensional spawn points can be subject to attacks from subterranean creatures in enclosed spaces. A bigger threat than usual dungeon mobs as they are outside the governing forces that come from within those areas. Creating the scarcity of the spawned loot. Sporadic dungeons that can't be farmed effectively as they spawn randomly. Items and treasures can be bound to the original winner. An ethereal or fourth-dimensional system put in place that regulates the items.

How about magic v warriors?

We can look at how all magic iterations tend to have a limit. Simple solution is to not forget about it. Then apply it in a way similar to gun combat. Run out and run away. Different way is to make warriors easier to gain resistances as part of a feedback of having superior bodies. Take a look at history and see how throwing bodies at something tends to work out eventually.

I'll probably update this randomly.

No. I'm not procrastinating. I'm gathering inspiration...yeah.

Simplify your points lol

 

[ConansWitchBaby]

nevah

 

[LABmaiL]

I've wondered for a long time how to give certain elements, prompts, formulas, tropes, etc. in stories a fresh spin. Especially after going into different writing forums/websites/groups and seeing the same argument that everything is over-used and unoriginal. Without putting in the effort of explaining what they even want.

In my time reading, I've found that the best stories that have a spin on tropes don't actually have worlds that function that differently from what they are 'parodying' (for lack of a better word). I've found that the best trope-benders are those who create some narrative twist rather than a worldbuilding twist. For example, I read a novel which was a spin on all those Isekai/system stories.
The author bent both, not by changing the functions of the world, but by changing the effects on the characters themselves. It turns out that the main character was not a person who reincarnated with their memories. Rather, they were a repurposed soul with fake memories and a fake life, used by a god to escape punishment for skipping work. Additionally, the system is best described as a soul-farm, meant to harness energy from the populous rather than truly improve people, at the cost of those who unknowingly give too much energy.
These two changes, while doing little to vary the tropes from what's normal, severely re-contextualize the setting as a whole by changing what these tropes mean to the main character. The system still functions the exact same way and the MC is still a person born with memories from another life. However, the world feels darker and more hopeless due to the reconstruction of these tropes.
The world feels fresh because the perspective is different, not the tropes themselves.

I hope this is somewhat legible. I just kinda spat out my thoughts.

 

[Agentt]

Just put a time limit to it.
Make it so that there is no refinement method available, or that the thing starts to lose mana immediately.

Hence, it is essential that only fresh materials are used, and everything other than that is pretty much useless. Or you can call it low grade material which is used to create things for peasants.

This is very much like our present mines. While we do have limited resources which will end one day, for now we can assume our mines are infinite. They have been supplying us resources for a long time and are still continuing to do so.
Yet, this doesn't create a saturation because of quality of ores, the rising population and the rising standards of living

 

[LilRora]

I think the problem you are talking about impossible to fix even in long term, and it's this exact problem that makes the rare, unique stories so amazing.

Spoiler: Tis not a spoiler, tis to make it small

One example I have on the tip of my tongue is Vigor Mortis by Thundamoo. Without spoiling too much of what it is all about, the few things I'd like to mention are:
1. The world consists of a huge amount of islands orbitting around Mistwatcher, who/that is considered to be a God by many people. This in itself makes the story setting incredibly unique, because the world is completely different than we're used to.
2. Magic is not in form of spells like fantasy taught us, where you chant 'fireball' and you have a spell. The magic, while it isn't described in any detail, has its own unique rules, like channeling mana is needed to gather it and use it from the surroundings. Additionally, mana is very destructive, and not without reason people learn cancellation sumbols (or something, forgot how it's called), that are used to prevent you fron blowing yourself up with your own mana you lost control of.
Then the magic itself doesn't come in spells like in fantasy, but the spells are very complex structures of mana. It's hard to learn magic, and despite the fact that everyone can use it (I think?), magic users are very rare comparing to total number of people. There are also talents coming into play, which are natural abilities that sort of manipulate mana by themselves, and they can be incredibly varied.
3. What connects mana and worldbuilding in Vigor Mortis is the origin of mana. Most stories show mana as something that is, period. That's boring, generic, and there's nothing you can do with that fact because you don't have anything to pull to unravel more of the subject. In Vigor Mortis it's much different - mana comes from the Mistwatcher. It's not explained further than that for a long while, but this one simple fact already completely changes the world. Though what's important is that for the first few tens of chapters (around 60, if I remember correctly, but I'm not sure) it doesn't have any great impact on the story for the reader, while being the perpetrator of many events that only the author can see and explain properly at that point in time.
4. Metal! The best material for armor, weapons, a good magic conductor, and generally something that every person who values themselves would have a lot of it for various uses... or not. The reason I wrote 'metal' is because that's all Vigor Mortis says about is. There's no copper, no iron, no steel, there's metal. And apparently Misty is hungry for it, though the reason for that is explained somewhere around chapter 100, if I'm not mistaken. Till then all you know is that you don't collect a lot of metal in one place, or you'll get a hole in the island after the Mistwatcher takes it. And, what's better, is that this idea is used for a whole plot event before it's explained why it happens at all!
These four things are very simple on surface level, but you don't need more at the beginning of the story - you can come up with more details as you go on, or not at all if you don't want.

In my opinion, if you want to have a different, original story, the first thing to do is to find something that would differentiate it from the rest that would have world-level influence, but be very simple in its general idea.
For example in D.E.M.O.N.S. by Vongrak - the whole idea of the story (which had more than 600 chapters last I checked) is the mandatory demon summoning, which happens one a week, and how it affects a girl who dicovers she has demonic heritage. The idea is as simple as it sounds, and readers don't get to know much more details than they receive at the very beginning. It's the author that knows more, and it's only its effect on the story that matters.
Another example I have is Ryn of Avonside by QuietValerie, where magic is about, wait for it, plants! An idea incredibly simple in its core, that mages use plants to make their magic, but very original and unexplored. There are simply so many ways you can go with this idea that it's hard to stick to one. And we haven't even considered the other aspects of the story - an isekai, where the whole university campus is affected being the most notable one, which is a very flexible concept that's frankly way too rare, and the other supernatural energies.
You don't even have to explain why all that happens. It's good when readers have an explanation for the events and mechanics in the story, but they don't need them as long as it's shown in a good way and has real effect on the story.

Another thing I'd like to say is that you don't need to search far and wide to find answers to the questions you ask when making a world. In my opinion the key to making an original world is to make it simple. The readers don't need a ton of details that would only confuse them, and even if you need to do that, you should give those details in small doses.
My own way of doing it is that I come up with an event, with a character, or with a world aspect, and from there I develop what would match this thing.
When I was starting my story, practically the only thing I had was that the main character is trans, is a demoness, and has a mom who, avoiding spoilers, is very important to the whole story, and that the story is set largely in virtual reality where she would find a girlfriend. From this point I started thinking how to make the world match this character - I set it far into the future, using an old world I made with my brother, I created a unique virtual world. When I had the world, consisting of islands, I placed the story on one of them and started thinking how to make it interesting. I got an idea to make the strength of the monsters and mana density in the air increase as you approach the center of the island. Then only in chapter twnety-something I gave a glimpse of the reason for this, and I've yet to properly decide what will happen in this direction, if something will happen at all. Would be good to notice that the last point has as much to do with my first as my cousin from three generations back has with me (nothing, for the slow on the uptake).

Speaking about more classic magic, dungeons, loot and how to make it all good, the simplest way is to make some small twists that wouldn't do much on the surface, and either wouldn't be revealed at all or would be revealed to be something massive deeper into the story. Like LABmaiL wrote above, it's the small things that completely change how the story feels. The devil's in the details, you could say.
Looking at magic, I think I said enough about Vigor Mortis.
If we're talking about dungeons, a past example would be sentient dungeon core. Right now it's already pretty used up, but if you do a small twist, for example make the dungeon core a slave to the dungeon master that is bound by its programming and escapes the dungeon's confines at the first chance it has (The Celestail by Dynorion, arguably), you have a fresh whiff or air to the generic idea.
Loot is a sorta completely overexploited idea that's so common and generic it's hard to even find something no one has ever done. The advice above still stands, but remember that not everything in your story has to be original. Though if you really want something unique in your loot, you can always go into realistic direction (which seems pretty rare) where you don't have drops from what you kill, but need to collect everything by yourself. I don't have any example right now, but making it more realistic opens up a lot of options that aren't really available either way. You can have the materials have different quality, for example, where the quality depends on the tiny details like an arrow piercing the hide, having used a better knife when skinning, or not optimal way to transport it. You can also have a twist that when enhancing the thing with magic, its bad state makes the enhancement exponenetially less effective.
This would make the materials of bad quality swarm the market, and the good things, seemingly originating from the same source, would be rare and still worth a lot. At the same time the bad quality things wouldn't be totally worthless, because a good skinner won't get any bad quality skin, so they would balance themselves out with the demand.

*takes a deep breath*
Dang, that's long, and I haven't written everything I thought about. Imma put it into spoiler tag to make it smaller. Hope it helps.

 

[ElijahRyne]

Tropes are helpful, because they are a familiar framework logged in something new. They become boring in 2 main ways:
1. You don’t expand the framework to turn it into something new. 2. There is more or an almost equivalent amount of tropes in the story, than new things.
Your story can be filled with tropes, but if your story stays unique it shouldn’t matter.

Now let’s look at Magic v Warrior.
If you do not define what magic is, or what a warrior is it would be a toss up, but the magic user would probably be expected to win slightly more. Why? Magic is, or should be, unique, while a fist is a fist.
There are many ways to make this less dry. The easiest is if you make being a warrior magical though it would change. Now there is no distinction, and the differences of how the magic is used can come up to the individual.
… If that makes any sense. Sorry I am not good at keeping things simple…

 

[LilRora]

Tropes are helpful, because they are a familiar framework logged in something new. They become boring in 2 main ways:
1. You don’t expand the framework to turn it into something new. 2. There is more or an almost equivalent amount of tropes in the story, than new things.
Your story can be filled with tropes, but if your story stays unique it shouldn’t matter.

I say it's like with learning. You need to give the readers something they can easily understand and sprinkle the new things in small doses not to overwhelm them, while doing it often enough so they won't get bored by the repetitiveness.

Now let’s look at Magic v Warrior.
If you do not define what magic is, or what a warrior is it would be a toss up, but the magic user would probably be expected to win slightly more. Why? Magic is, or should be, unique, while a fist is a fist.
There are many ways to make this less dry. The easiest is if you make being a warrior magical though it would change. Now there is no distinction, and the differences of how the magic is used can come up to the individual.
… If that makes any sense. Sorry I am not good at keeping things simple…

Nay, it's good. I think what you're trying to suggest is that you need to have a way to make the physical fighter able to go toe to toe with the mage without making them mages as well. A nice way I hardly see being used is having mages use mana and warriors use qi, or force, or some other thing that is the equivalent of mana for warriors, but works in a completely different way.

You can go even further with this idea and make each race or each class have a different type of energy. For example warriors would have force or qi, which is just doing things with brute force. Then rangers would be a variation of warriors, and they would have something relating to movement that would allow them to move quickly and shot quick and powerful attacks. Mages meanwhile would have versatile mana that relies on techniques and control, not force, and they could be divided into casters, summoners, and other.

If we're going into different races, you can have demons with much stronger energy that is susceptible to emotions and harder to control. Then you can have fairies, whose energy is weak, works in unpredictable ways and has the tendency to find its own ways to accomplish goals.

I'm just tossing random ideas for now, but yeah.

I think Magic v Warrior is a sort of bad idea. It depends on how you make the world, but it's almost impossible to make such fight fair. Unless you toss technology into the equation, but then you get a fight where first to attack wins, and that's also bad.

 

[BearlyAlive]

I tend to circumvent the mage vs might problem by giving everyone magic. It just makes no sense to have only a few mages unless there was a culling or some other form of external decimation. It's just too useful otherwise to not use it.

The loot-logic can be as complicated or as simple as you want it to be. You have a system? Bam, prices are fixed by the system and nobody cares that one greedy merchant has all phoenix downs because he can't inflate them (unless he controls the distribution but at that point the reader actually doesn't care unless it's an MC or a villain and major plot point).

You could turn your loot-economy into a free market, make the loots themself regulated, ignore it completely or do whatever you want with it. As long as it makes an ounce of sense you're good.

 

[ModernGold7ne]

I've wondered for a long time how to give certain elements, prompts, formulas, tropes, etc. in stories a fresh spin. Especially after going into different writing forums/websites/groups and seeing the same argument that everything is over-used and unoriginal. Without putting in the effort of explaining what they even want.

The one that got me thinking was a conversation yesterday about the economics in worlds that have spawning loot. Usually in gamelit/litrpg type of stories with regular fantasy dungeon stories. The simple problem with this is the over-saturation of what we on Earth would call valuables.

There can be over complicated fix-arounds by establishing mining vs farming practicality with cost revenues for heavy kingdom-building type stories. Explaining how waste product is handled if it's a novel that gives raw resources like uncut gems as rewards. Or if they dissipate and for how long before that process is done. How items are smelted for the far too common rusted version of items. The industrial complex of breaking down unwanted junk rewards into bulk goods. How even regular people that don't go and farm for the spawning rewards have a plethora of simple everyday items for their use.

For more monster-based stories or action-focused with the limited time or unwanted bogging down of world-building there can be easier alternatives. Non-dimensional spawn points can be subject to attacks from subterranean creatures in enclosed spaces. A bigger threat than usual dungeon mobs as they are outside the governing forces that come from within those areas. Creating the scarcity of the spawned loot. Sporadic dungeons that can't be farmed effectively as they spawn randomly. Items and treasures can be bound to the original winner. An ethereal or fourth-dimensional system put in place that regulates the items.

How about magic v warriors?

We can look at how all magic iterations tend to have a limit. Simple solution is to not forget about it. Then apply it in a way similar to gun combat. Run out and run away. Different way is to make warriors easier to gain resistances as part of a feedback of having superior bodies. Take a look at history and see how throwing bodies at something tends to work out eventually.

I'll probably update this randomly.

No. I'm not procrastinating. I'm gathering inspiration...yeah.

I don't have that problem cause, well Anima Aliena is, alien. Mostly anyway.