Robin Hood and Vietnam War era

Rambo?

All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing
Edmund Burke

You are tired of people ignoring evil to protect themselves. You've made a stand!

Invoke: When rallying people to fight
Compel: When it is smarter to stay hidden

Star of the Show

Well if they're your typical parents they'll probably freak out for a few minutes before calling Everyone they can think of. Everyone. Friends, friends of friends, the cops, the fire department...they'll be terrified about their little girl.

well for your dwarfs instead of making them live in the mountains to resemble the rocks that they live around, make them from the plains if there are any in your world. yeah i know that sounds weird but if the area is under constant assault by wind storms then being short would be an advantage, and instead of giving them the build of a boulder build them more like the scrub trees that are found in plains lands, short and really hardened.

as for the humans yeah different religions factions and forms of government are great, one could be simpler Japan where the emperor is the embodiment of their god/s, another could be feudal society, and another could be Romanesque. as for churches i think a sect of sorcerer monks would be scary as hell especially if they viewed enlightenment is the same manner as Shaolin monks.

First off I have to say I really like your idea. It sounds great so far!

World building is fun but it can be tough. The other day I listened to a podcast and heard a good bit of advice from a successful author. (Can't remember her name, sorry) She said that when she was world building she takes real world, events, cultures, and people that fascinated her and emulated them.

Another technique is the List and Twist. Let's look at some elements that typical fantasy dwarves have:

Drink, hoard gold, short, rowdy, stubborn, etc.

Then try to swap out or change some of these characteristics to make something that still has the same spirit but adds a unique flavor. "What if?" is always a good starting point. What if dwarves were always born as sets of identical twins? What if they worship cave demons? What if they're a matriarchal society? Etc. and so forth.

You could do the same thing with your human cultures. Take something familiar then dissect it then shoot a bunch of what if's at the idea till you come up with something that drives you.

One thing to remember is that no culture is homogenous. Some writers seem to disregard this. All Klingons are warriors; all elves are sublime, spiritual beings, etc.

Whatever direction you take your project, I wish you luck!

Both of these are great, and I'm definitely going to use suggestions from both.

I just have one more problem. I'm looking for a word that would serve as a derogatory term towards normal humans. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Also, what do you guys think about curse words in fantasy novels? Should I make up my own?

So I've been working on this fantasy world for a while now. I'm trying to move away from the typical fantasy feel of the genre and move into a bit of a more down to earth thing modeled after a more urban fantasy. No world saving for my characters, just a prima donna, wanna be sorceress and her group of basically conscripted slaves as they march along the countryside, trying to prove she can handle magic and responsibility as well as anyone. That way the human system of government won't execute her for crimes against humanity

See, in my world, humans are the only race that can use magic. It was given to them by their God in an attempt to allow them to compete with the more physically fit species of the world. Only problem is that Sorcerers, being the greedy bastards they are, claimed their "God given" right of superiority over the rest of humanity, and now the rest of the race are second class citizens.

My main character really fucks up her first assignment and kills a whole bunch of people, including her master. The ruling body in the land gets wind of it and gives her two options: Death, or an essentially suicide mission against a small dukedom that's rebelled against the current rule (bloody civil war, you know the drill) So my MC rounds up a few of the survivors of her massacre and forces them to follow her into the mouth of Hell. Fun huh?

I've got most of the races set up in an interesting way, something that kinda-sorta breaks the mold, at least enough to make them interesting. I have a new race in there, which is fun for me. But I'm having trouble with 2 things: Firstly, the Dwarves. And Secondly, human subgroups.

1. Dwarves: I can't think of any way to make them original. They sit in mountains. They drink beer. I guess that's been so ingraned in my mind (and hasn't been warped with my eternal hatred, like what happened to the elves  ) that I can't think of any truly interesting way to make them different. Any suggestions?

2. The humans. I'm really struggling here. I'm thinking of dividing them into 3 major kingdoms, each with Sorcerers at the top. But what I'm really aiming for here is something Dresden-esque; there's all these different factions running around that Harry has to negotiate through, and I can't think of anything.

Hi, I'm Harrison.

(Hi, Harrison)

I first picked up the Dresden Files...God knows how long ago, but I've been writing for what seems like forever. (Which, in fact, isn't very long, since I'm just a high school sophomore) At the time, I hammered each of my stories out on a pad of notebook paper and each seemed like an instant Pulitzer Prize winner, though I look at them now and am brought close to tears.
Now I write the modern way, on a laptop, and my productivity has gone up...I think. I'm notorious for writers block and it doesn't help to have the whole wide internet at my fingertips whenever I'm trying to write  I write mostly urban fantasy (I have Jim to thank for this obsession, I can't seem to focus on anything else anymore) and right now am working on a few different projects, my main one being called Werelight. It's a fantasy set in modern day America about a group of shape shifters, and so far I'm quite pleased with it.