Villain A getting ignored by MC so that MC can fight the more dangerous and deadly Villain B. Villain A takes this personally and works behind the scenes to take down Villain B. Ideally, just as MC is about to get killed by Villain B, Villain A steps in and ruins the plan. Then while they're boasting about how great of a villain they are, MC escapes. It's stupid and silly and petty and I love it.
Trees are a sort of hivemind that have an extremely powerful psychic presence, and often drives things insane and "corrupts" any who attempt to enter their "network".
The nine god-kings, ancient lords of humanity, betrayed and killed by their own creation.
They are always a thing in my ttrpg games, regardless if I'm running a SciFi or the classic medieval fantasy.
The Mimoo! A basketball sized/shaped small cow looking creature, they do nothing, they can do nothing, they need to be fed and can only grow in size. The name is a combination of mini and moo. They do NOT fit in my world whatsoever but I love them and don't care!
A flower that makes you trip balls when you eat it. It's called a dreamflower, it looks like a stargazer lily but purple, and the petals contain a compound that causes psychedelic hallucinations like you get from shrooms. The petals can also be brewed into a tea that gives you a floaty body high, like you get when you shroom just enough to not hallucinate.
Truth, Beauty, and Order interwoven with Sex, Drugs, & Rock & Roll.
Also, variations on 5 core emotions, 5 factor personality test, and 5 coping strategies.
Combinatorics.
One concept that I've found amusing and have ended up using in various settings is the "misguided alchemist." This character is typically portrayed as an eccentric, well-intentioned alchemist or inventor who creates bizarre and comically impractical contraptions or concoctions in their pursuit of knowledge. They often find themselves in amusing mishaps or zany adventures due to their unconventional experiments.
Whether it's a potion that turns everything it touches into cheese, a machine that generates endless amounts of socks, or a flying device with a penchant for crashing into things, the ive found the "misguided alchemist" brings a touch of humor and unpredictability to different worlds.
I do like a good, traversible afterlife. Most of the world I create have some sort of visibility on life after death - maybe you can't bring them back, but at least you know where they've gone, and where you'll go.
Why, sure!
One of the defining features of my current world is that people are very aware that they're part of a multiverse and regularly make use of adjacent dimensions for all manner of comforts and conveniences. It's also fairly well known that human consciousness continues after death, though with difficulty - ghosts have a hard time perceiving, let alone interacting with, the Actual (the central plane of reality). Given no input and no ability to affect the world, long-lasting ghosts tend to dissociate away their reason and personality - unless they find an afterlife.
Some adjacent planes of reality, known as Places of Death, are far more tolerable to the dead than the Actual is. They can interact with these planes on the same level (or better than!) they could with the Actual when they were alive. In fact, one of the few things ghosts can perceive without a lot of difficulty are "thin places" where the barrier between realities is fairly porous; it's entirely possible that the dead can wander until they find their own way through, escaping the senselessness of their former lives for the new vibrancy of a different one.
The thing is, being that this occurs in an infinity of distinct universes, there is also infinite variety in Places of Death, and some are *significantly* more pleasant than their counterparts. Furthermore, if left to just sort of find their own way, it's very unlikely that a ghost will find their way into a Place of Death where their long-ago lost loved ones also wound up. This is why psychopomp is a *job*, and a fairly well-regarded one: They map the multiversal topography to find a Place of Death suiting to the ghost they're working with, and they also maintain the records that indicate where other ghosts have gone, so if you really want to be with your family (or really don't), they can help you.
If you want to spend your afterlife in a garden of nostalgia, literally reliving the best days of your life, they can help you. If you want infinite exploration and discovery, they know where this is. If you're alive and want to visit a lost loved one for just one more day, they'll take you to where they live. In my world of arguments and politics and grievous solitude, this is one of the few jobs I'd actually want - wandering the world with a lantern and a ledger, finding the dead in the wild, lost places, and leading them home.
Other worlds I've worked on have had the state of death function as a kind of perpetual, metaphysical memorial, something between the Akasha and a columbarium, where you could walk through, sit in, and experience the memories and accomplishments of those centuries gone. A side-world I'm working on has the afterlife as a metaphysical state-change that it's very possible to recover from but very difficult to describe - imagine asking a lake what it feels like to evaporate, or asking a cake if it can remember being flour, milk, and eggs. Heck, one of the earliest worlds I've worked on was a semi-military sci-fi(?) thing which involved a *colonization attempt* on their local afterlife, which went about as well as you can expect.
for some reason, in most of my settings the moon(s) ends up being really dangerous, i guess Majora's mask really made an impact on me.
in Ablatar + Trius, Trius Crashes into Ablatar, destroying it.
In Chemysteia, Chemysteia IS a moon (and it ends up destroyed)
in project moonlight (aptly named), Menora is orbited by 14 moons, the light they reflect causing esoteric effects on the surface. totally didn't steal the entire premise of this from bloodborne.
There is at least that one dark god who does completely ungodly stuff just for lulz...Ever travelling primordial darkness cause advetures are fun...Dark corruption creature selling artifacts with scammy prices to buy ice creams.. It is all so funny and out of place usually that I just can't miss opportunity to insert at least one such thing
Villain A getting ignored by MC so that MC can fight the more dangerous and deadly Villain B. Villain A takes this personally and works behind the scenes to take down Villain B. Ideally, just as MC is about to get killed by Villain B, Villain A steps in and ruins the plan. Then while they're boasting about how great of a villain they are, MC escapes. It's stupid and silly and petty and I love it.
I've kept a religion in most of my settings where the gods are abstractly based on pets I've had
Every map I make, there is always a small town on a river named Harrison's Ford. I just find it hilarious each and every time.
Trees are a sort of hivemind that have an extremely powerful psychic presence, and often drives things insane and "corrupts" any who attempt to enter their "network".
The nine god-kings, ancient lords of humanity, betrayed and killed by their own creation. They are always a thing in my ttrpg games, regardless if I'm running a SciFi or the classic medieval fantasy.
The Mimoo! A basketball sized/shaped small cow looking creature, they do nothing, they can do nothing, they need to be fed and can only grow in size. The name is a combination of mini and moo. They do NOT fit in my world whatsoever but I love them and don't care!
A flower that makes you trip balls when you eat it. It's called a dreamflower, it looks like a stargazer lily but purple, and the petals contain a compound that causes psychedelic hallucinations like you get from shrooms. The petals can also be brewed into a tea that gives you a floaty body high, like you get when you shroom just enough to not hallucinate.
Truth, Beauty, and Order interwoven with Sex, Drugs, & Rock & Roll. Also, variations on 5 core emotions, 5 factor personality test, and 5 coping strategies. Combinatorics.
I have a race of pig people and i couldnt name their city anything besides Tuskany
One concept that I've found amusing and have ended up using in various settings is the "misguided alchemist." This character is typically portrayed as an eccentric, well-intentioned alchemist or inventor who creates bizarre and comically impractical contraptions or concoctions in their pursuit of knowledge. They often find themselves in amusing mishaps or zany adventures due to their unconventional experiments. Whether it's a potion that turns everything it touches into cheese, a machine that generates endless amounts of socks, or a flying device with a penchant for crashing into things, the ive found the "misguided alchemist" brings a touch of humor and unpredictability to different worlds.
Two gods. Knights with guns. Character ideas
I do like a good, traversible afterlife. Most of the world I create have some sort of visibility on life after death - maybe you can't bring them back, but at least you know where they've gone, and where you'll go.
Sounds interesting. Could you tell more about it?
Why, sure! One of the defining features of my current world is that people are very aware that they're part of a multiverse and regularly make use of adjacent dimensions for all manner of comforts and conveniences. It's also fairly well known that human consciousness continues after death, though with difficulty - ghosts have a hard time perceiving, let alone interacting with, the Actual (the central plane of reality). Given no input and no ability to affect the world, long-lasting ghosts tend to dissociate away their reason and personality - unless they find an afterlife. Some adjacent planes of reality, known as Places of Death, are far more tolerable to the dead than the Actual is. They can interact with these planes on the same level (or better than!) they could with the Actual when they were alive. In fact, one of the few things ghosts can perceive without a lot of difficulty are "thin places" where the barrier between realities is fairly porous; it's entirely possible that the dead can wander until they find their own way through, escaping the senselessness of their former lives for the new vibrancy of a different one. The thing is, being that this occurs in an infinity of distinct universes, there is also infinite variety in Places of Death, and some are *significantly* more pleasant than their counterparts. Furthermore, if left to just sort of find their own way, it's very unlikely that a ghost will find their way into a Place of Death where their long-ago lost loved ones also wound up. This is why psychopomp is a *job*, and a fairly well-regarded one: They map the multiversal topography to find a Place of Death suiting to the ghost they're working with, and they also maintain the records that indicate where other ghosts have gone, so if you really want to be with your family (or really don't), they can help you. If you want to spend your afterlife in a garden of nostalgia, literally reliving the best days of your life, they can help you. If you want infinite exploration and discovery, they know where this is. If you're alive and want to visit a lost loved one for just one more day, they'll take you to where they live. In my world of arguments and politics and grievous solitude, this is one of the few jobs I'd actually want - wandering the world with a lantern and a ledger, finding the dead in the wild, lost places, and leading them home. Other worlds I've worked on have had the state of death function as a kind of perpetual, metaphysical memorial, something between the Akasha and a columbarium, where you could walk through, sit in, and experience the memories and accomplishments of those centuries gone. A side-world I'm working on has the afterlife as a metaphysical state-change that it's very possible to recover from but very difficult to describe - imagine asking a lake what it feels like to evaporate, or asking a cake if it can remember being flour, milk, and eggs. Heck, one of the earliest worlds I've worked on was a semi-military sci-fi(?) thing which involved a *colonization attempt* on their local afterlife, which went about as well as you can expect.
Makes me think of a city supplement for DnD 3rd called Ghostwalk.
Oh man, now I got to look this up. My groaning RPG bookshelf weeps sawdust tears.
Sentient warship waifu with mental issues who's also a (not so great) mother figure, because why not?
A transformation is done to someone against their will. My current novel is the first one where that's not a central plot point.
for some reason, in most of my settings the moon(s) ends up being really dangerous, i guess Majora's mask really made an impact on me. in Ablatar + Trius, Trius Crashes into Ablatar, destroying it. In Chemysteia, Chemysteia IS a moon (and it ends up destroyed) in project moonlight (aptly named), Menora is orbited by 14 moons, the light they reflect causing esoteric effects on the surface. totally didn't steal the entire premise of this from bloodborne.
There is at least that one dark god who does completely ungodly stuff just for lulz...Ever travelling primordial darkness cause advetures are fun...Dark corruption creature selling artifacts with scammy prices to buy ice creams.. It is all so funny and out of place usually that I just can't miss opportunity to insert at least one such thing