S1E0.2 Wanting Something Together
Ansel and Maui are the Worldbuilders, part of an ancient line stretching back beyond generations to the origins of creativity and creation itself. As long as humanity has told stories, we have created our worlds with histories, geographies, and physics all their own.
Over the course of three episodes, we will build a new world along with some of our favorite storytellers.
Tune in on Twitch for adventures in the new setting! https://www.twitch.tv/reflectgames
Transcript:
Speaker 1 0:03
Adventurers, storytellers, welcome to this week's edition of the world builders society with Ansel and Maui.
Ansel Burch 0:18
Today's episode was recorded live on twitch.tv/reflect, games on January 13, 2026 full video is available on youtube at youtube.com/@reflectstudios.
Maui 0:34
Shall we hop into the actual world building?
Ansel Burch 0:39
Yes, I think we shall, all
Maui 0:41
right, let's do it. Isn't Ansel looking amazing. Look at that hair.
Ansel Burch 0:45
Look at that haircut. Yeah, yeah, it's fresh. It's fresh.
Maui 0:49
All right, let's get let's, you know what we're gonna go over to the world building screen here,
Ansel Burch 0:56
it's time. Journey with us. Ooh. Behold the blank whiteboard.
Maui 1:06
We're gonna establish our world and our themes right now. So do you have any thoughts in terms of a theme?
Ansel Burch 1:14
Ansel, I don't, although the discussion of emotional damage today has been consistent, and I'm I'm kind of here to see if we can do something that has a romantic or emotional core.
Maui 1:31
I did so funny. You say that, because the first thing that popped into my head was love and loss of love. So I think we're on the same kind of track right
Ansel Burch 1:40
here for that. So if our theme starts with love, what are the other corollary themes that we want to have in there? Is there? Is there conflict around the love? Or is the love a given?
Maui 1:52
I think there's probably some sort of conflict around the love, would be my thought. I had an idea a while back that I've never gotten to do, and I didn't have any like world around it or anything, but I had an idea of people that had lost, people that they had loved in some way, shape or form, and they're on a journey to like, Find that love, but they don't know that they've lost it. Like, part of like, doing this crucible is that you have to, like, forget that you ever loved in the first place.
Ansel Burch 2:33
That's cool. So it starts off as, like an Orpheus thing, yeah? But then there's a, there's a surrender that's required.
Maui 2:42
Yeah, there was actually Audrey three in the chat. Did this idea called darkness, where you didn't know who you were, you didn't know any of your stats, and as you started playing, you would like, find like, you would learn what you could do. And so they would give you your stats over time. So you would, you might say, like, I want to try and get big. It's like, oh, you actually have them large. So you get big, you know, or it's dark, and I just want it to be bright in here, and you cast light, you know, things like that. So potentially, like, you know, reclamation of self, you know, is part of that journey. Because how can you love somebody else? If you don't love yourself, you don't love yourself, you don't know yourself. How can you love anybody else? So that might be part of the crucible.
Ansel Burch 3:46
Thank you, Mama. Ru, yeah, okay, I'm here for that. Is this a story that begins in media res in, in that darkness, in that that fog of unknowing. Or do we start? Because I think part of the journey is, is giving up so like, do we get partway through the story and then surrender our character sheets to become utterly changed.
Maui 4:28
So when we did it, the DM made the characters and we were learning not only what they could do, but also about their lives as we were going, which was very interesting. So you could do it that way, or you could do it, I think what could be fun is you could. Either they can make their own characters and then they hand over their character sheets, or you would pre make the characters, and they would learn who they are and whether or not they were a good person, or what kind of love that they lose. They lose a child. Did they lose like the love of their life, did they lose their parent? Did they lose their pet?
Ansel Burch 5:24
So you're kind of in favor of the given circumstance being the sacrifice has already taken place.
Maui 5:33
I kind of like that idea. And then you find out through flashbacks, throughout the one shot, what you've done, like, maybe it's like a pact with a demon, you know, that starts this thing. So when we start, like I said, we're in media Ray, and they wake up on a beach and they have no idea, like, who they are, you know,
Ansel Burch 6:05
I have done this a couple times, and it is always a good time.
Maui 6:09
It's a great, like, evocative way to kind of start a thing.
Ansel Burch 6:17
So we give them blank sheets to fill in as we go.
Maui 6:21
Yeah, it's also a really good way, I think, to teach people how to play DND, how to play ttrpgs, one of the core concepts of like, what makes a good player. It's something that I read recently, and the player's guide for nimble, which is a new system that I've just fallen in love with. And one of the things he says is, like, like, describe actions, not mechanics, right? So this kind of helps you do that, because you're not, like, looking at a sheet trying to figure out, what do you say? Like, I punch him as hard as I can, or like, I summon, like, all the energy inside of me and scream and, you know, and you see what happens, right? You like, you're describing what you want to do. You're not describing like, oh, I cast fireball, you know. It creates a narrative structure inherently for the player.
Ansel Burch 7:20
Okay, stop me if this is dumb, but what if that's the theme? Like, what if that's the core center of this is I want. And so it's not that you're not trying to figure out the mechanics of the game. That's not the point of this. The like, there's not a meta game where you're trying to learn what your character sheet contains. It's, I It's the, it's the, like, musical character idea, right? I want, and I want so hard that I can't just talk about it anymore. I have to do magic or become a, you know, super martial artist, or, you know, whatever the the outcome is. But I love motivation, yeah, that that manifests.
Maui 8:09
Hear me out. Let me Yes. Hand off of that. All right, what if the the magic in this world, you cannot access magic until you have found your love, until you have found your bliss, until you have found like the thing that kind of elevates you from your consciousness, you know, like in the Pixar movie soul, you could hit like that zone where you would kind of transcend, You know. But if magic isn't something that just anybody can do, like you have to find that thing inside, if you have to find your I want, you know,
Ansel Burch 8:55
yeah, okay, okay, theater school, I can talk motivations,
Maui 9:01
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think we're I think we're cooking with some gas here. Also, apologies, everybody. I'm under the weather. For those of you are just joining us, if I sound crazy, it's because I don't really have a voice right now, so and very stuffy, but I am having a blast. This is my medicine. Okay.
Ansel Burch 9:28
Okay, so I think this is a good time to to throw it to the chat while we keep talking. Are there any pieces of media or references that you're picking up from what we're putting down. Oh, we can put into our little sidebar of inspiration. Feel free to throw those into the chat. We'd love to see them.
Maui 9:48
I'm gonna, I'm gonna talk to one to get the ball rolling. What Dreams May Come. Agent of interest said, I want me some betrayal and pain.
Ansel Burch 9:59
I. Ooh, I'm just gonna put that into themes.
Maui 10:06
And in Audrey said, before I go, the giver that Black Mirror episode with the dating app machine thing.
All right, we're cooking. We're cooking. So we got ourselves some references. We got ourselves some themes, yeah, and I think, like love and concept over love and self discovery. I think, you know, I think that love could be different, like, it could be that the person is trying to, like, find a reason to love themselves, right? Like, there's all sorts, oh yeah. Love can mean very, you know, various things, you know, which I think is nice too to like, show like, yeah, you have romantic love, but you also have platonic love and self love and like, there's all these different like, paths of what that means.
Ansel Burch 11:08
Yeah, yeah,
Maui 11:12
okay, I don't
Ansel Burch 11:14
think we need to over define that now, but I'm excited to see where we go with it. Yes, that's got some good some meat on it. Do you
Maui 11:23
want to do NPCs now, or do you want to
Ansel Burch 11:26
move along the world? Yeah, okay, let's talk about the world, in a world where, where these are the dominant themes, and we have this ritual, for lack of a better term, like, what is the, what do we think is the, is the like, environmental pressure that brings that into being? Like, what is it that creates that environment, where, where we have this ritual of emotional detachment and rediscovery? I mean, I guess maybe part of it is, this is a world where, if you want something badly enough, you can break physics about it. So maybe it's a self defense thing.
Maui 12:14
I think from what we've described and how like emotions and want can, like, give you magic. Like, the first thing I start to think of is a fey realm.
Ansel Burch 12:27
Oh, sure. So it's more about, like, manifesting,
Maui 12:32
yeah, like, emotion and want can become manifest.
Ansel Burch 12:42
Yeah, yeah. I like that. I like that. So do we think like, do we just want to go super traditional magic forest, this bad boy, you know, give us lots of liminal spaces. And, you know, copses between trees where things change shape,
Maui 13:02
yeah, I think, like, I think for the world to my mind, wild and impermanence are the words that are kind of coming to mind.
Ansel Burch 13:14
Ooh, yes, I like that.
Maui 13:22
By the way, everybody, if you are a DM and you would be interested in being on this show, hit us up. Send a DM to either indecisionist or to reflect the two of us run each of those channels respectively, and we would love to take you on a journey of world discovery. You Yeah,
Ansel Burch 13:44
okay, so, and that gives us a chance to do like, like, almost dream movement, where we don't have to worry so much about, like, how you get from point A to point B, moving from one, from one clearing to the next, almost, and it gives it that sort of more ethereal feel in the storytelling, yeah, I think will change the way that you experience it as a player,
Maui 14:14
beanie, ass. Is there any magical difference between wanting Jinx? Yeah, want to need, I think, absolutely right, like, or is it just kind of two paths to the same thing?
Ansel Burch 14:33
That's a good question, because I feel like the the power in musicals, right is like, I want this so badly that it's, it's taken the core of myself and manifested it into the world around me. And I don't think that, in that, in that usage, that need is a distinguishing factor. Need, maybe is, is a coloring of that want. And. Like it's when it becomes a need that it takes on a different tone. Maybe need is dark magic, like you're willing to do darker things or make darker pacts to achieve need, or when need is on the table,
Maui 15:17
perhaps, yeah, yeah. Is it a healthy need? Is it? Is it? Is it greed? Right? Like need could also be greed, right? Like the need could also be necessity, you know? So I think it kind of depends on, on what, what it is that you want, and why it is that you want it. I just had a thought, if we do the whole like blank sheets to fill in as they go, What if we attach like the various like abilities that they have to questions of self? What if this entire thing is a way to create a character in media Ray, right? Like, so, okay, you have magic. You can do an energy blast, but how does that magic manifest itself? And it could be that could be tied into like answer one of these questions, what is your favorite expression? What is your favorite kind of artistic expression? Right? So it's like, oh, I'm a dancer. This is something that I've been wanting to do for a while as well. Actually, is a magic system that manifests from doing the things that you love, right? So, like, it could, they could say, like, oh, I sing, and they sing their magic into existence. Or I dance. I dance my magic into existence. I fight. So I, you know, I throw magic fucking bunches and hit people in the face with, with with my with my power. You know, Beanie just said, What happens if what someone wants directly or physically affects another person? Is there some sort of clash of wills? That's a good question. Yeah, right. I think in in that it's got to be in that is how you end up in in your combat scenarios, right? In a world where magic is in, power is manifested from like self definition and self realization and things like that. If two people need the same thing you could you could definitely see them fighting, or you could have monsters that feed off of romantic love, right? So they are attracted to you and want to, like, eat your brains because or eat your heart because you truly love someone, right? Yeah, that's beanie. That's actually kind of exactly what I'm saying. It's a Buzzfeed style character creation system. I'm here for that that like, ties into, like, core memories. Oops, all bards is hilarious.
Ansel Burch 18:22
I wonder, is the world that we live in only possible because of consensus? And so it's because everyone is manifesting this world all at the same time, but it is your need and want to make it different that is changing things. And if you run into someone else who has a disagree, a disagreeable nature or different, disagreeable view or want, it sort of ripples reality almost.
Maui 18:58
Have you seen Puss in Boots the last wish?
Ansel Burch 19:01
I haven't, but I bet I'm describing something they did in there.
Maui 19:04
So there's they get. They end up in this world. And whenever one of them is holding the map, the treasure map, the world around them completely changes to fit the person who's holding the map, or it's your quest right now. So you just re skinned the entire world. And if two people are holding the map, like those two worlds would clash, right? Like, it could be something like that. Like, you don't necessarily, like, always influence the world. But if you are, if you are on a quest, if you are, if you were given some sort of quest, the the shape of things changes because you are the one with the quest. So if you're multiple people with a quest, it could change depending. On who is holding the MacGuffin that changes the thing, you know, it like within a party, you know, oh, we and that could also be how you figure out how to get through things. Like, I like, I'm Ace. I know nothing. I'm Ace and I'm arrow, ace. I don't know anything about that stuff. And we need that to get past this thing. I'm going to give it to you the other thing, but I am looking for how to love myself, so if you give it back to me, now, we can get past this obstacle, right? And it's like tying it into that theme of impermanence and change and wildness, you know, as an idea.
Ansel Burch 20:47
Yeah, no, I like that. I like that
Maui 20:51
is wanting something too much or too often dangerous. Does it attract attention, either societal or from creatures? Probably, yeah.
Ansel Burch 21:05
I would think, yeah,
Maui 21:10
yeah, I would, I would def, I would say definitely, because it seems like this world is highly affected by people's wants and needs and emotions. So absolutely, I think if somebody centers themselves too much, that could be a dangerous thing in this world.
Ansel Burch 21:36
And it, I mean, it's got to be also like, is it a little bit antisocial to want something too much like is that the sort of thing that gets you sent off into the magical forest? Because you know clearly you need something that we don't have space for in tidy society.
Maui 22:00
You're not living in community. You are being a sociopath. You were thinking about me, me, me. You're not thinking about us, us, us. And that is affecting the town. You need to go to the forest to figure your shit out.
Ansel Burch 22:14
Yeah, it's safe over there for you to be doing what you're doing, right?
Maui 22:20
Yeah, in a way, it's like teaching people how to be in community with each other, right? Like, figure out the thing that you're missing because you are affecting the world around you. It could be something that just kind of happens as kids get to a certain age and start wanting like that, like that, independence and success, things like that, and then, like the parents say, go to the forest, you know, and learn what's actually important to you, and then come back to the society. Yeah, because us as Faye, our emotions affect the world around us. You are imposing your will on everybody around you right now because you're, you're, you know, you're feeling too much, you're taking up too much space. We're not saying that you can't shine, but you have to do so in a way that doesn't extinguish someone else's life, you know, are there laws supervision around wanting? Are there safeguards against malicious wants? You take that one, sir.
Ansel Burch 23:35
I mean, there's, there's gotta be. And maybe that's what this is. It's, you know, we send you. We send you into the woods. You want something so bad, you love something so much that we are sending you into the unknown with a blank slate. You know, in through some through some magic, we are, we are removing your sense of self so that you can rediscover who you are and what's really important. And kids are super dangerous, absolutely,
Maui 24:08
yeah, they're the most powerful in the tribe because of their hungry spine wanted.
Ansel Burch 24:14
Yeah, oh my God, every household with children is even more of a disaster in this world. Yeah. How did we do that? But, yeah, so I think, I think this is that and, and who's to say that it's good? You know, I There are elements of this that, depending on how it's being applied in any given situation, could be super harmful to a person. You know, they're just trying to be themselves, and you're telling them to, like, tamp down your light, get out there in the forest and figure shit out when you come back, you better not be, you know, blowing up the house, because you, you know, need stuff that's that's kind of messed up, or it could be if, if applied in in the wrong context or with the wrong intent.
Maui 25:00
Question, right? Yeah, I think the positive side of this is like learning shared agreements and living in community with one another, and the negative side of it is assimilation and making everybody be the same, right? So then I guess the question would be, is this enclave or whatever, is this the well adjusted version of that, or the bad, just version of that? And are there other communities within this magical forest that do this differently, right? Like there are good there are places that have figured out how to live in community, and there are places that are under the despotic rule of somebody who wants more, right above Bill, who wants above all?
Ansel Burch 25:45
Yeah? Oh, god, that's absolutely what it is. Because the evil empire would use this same ritual where they take away, they strip away, who you are and what you want, and put you into a place where, as you relearn, you're relearning it in their shape, yeah? And because this is the Feywild, we're sending you out in the woods, absent of us, yeah, to completely reshape who you are and what you want without the influence of anybody else, except for these four randos that happen to be in the same reason, you know, you're forming an identity together, rather than using the bits and tatters that your parents and your your neighbors left behind. Yeah, it's got that, like coming of age at the lake house sort of feel right where, like you just go feral for a summer and there's those eight kids. This is not something that happened to me, but it's a movie trope. Just to be clear, didn't have that going on. But yeah, that that trope of, like, you know, these eight people were, were sort of sent off into the woods on a lake house to find ourselves at the age of, you know, 16 or 17 or whatever, and we made a bunch of dumb mistakes, and somebody jumped in the lake fully clothed, and we burned a house down. But, boy, are we the best of friends now, sort of that, but with, with, you know, world shaking, magic involved, right?
Maui 27:17
And I think the only way, like, the only reason that, like, the world hasn't burned down is because everybody's immortal, right? Like, it's not, like the consequences of necessarily death, it's just being miserable for eternity because you impose your view upon everybody else.
Ansel Burch 27:33
Yeah, the queen of spring comes down and says, Hey, let's all stop with this and just puts it all back, right? Yeah? Yeah. And then we all laugh as the scene fades out, right?
Maui 27:49
Which is why, like, I think there's also room in this somewhere for, like, a sequel, one shot where, like, maybe if you really can't learn your lesson, they send you to the Mortal Realm, where your wants don't affect the world around you, and you just have to fucking deal with it.
Ansel Burch 28:08
So not to get ahead of ourselves. But do we think that the conflict is internal, right? So we put these kids out into the woods where they're where their wants become manifest? Or do we think that the conflict is our, our purely intentioned community abuts a fascist community, and the kids have to deal with these people who are trying to fit their their children into the same mold, you know, generation after generation. Is that the conflict freeing those people from that situation? Hmm?
Maui 28:56
I think maybe, yeah, it
Ansel Burch 28:59
definitely ups the stakes if we find out that, like, Hey, I still don't know what my deal is, but I know that's messed up.
Maui 29:07
Yeah, or, or, do we want to focus on if this is a way to do a character creation kind of exercise it, you know, it could be like, it's a smaller, more interior self discovery. Rather than affecting the outside world, it's just learning to affect your, you know, the the world inside you for yourself, you know. So then the conflict in that case could be here are, you know, X amount of Fae kids and fake kids like you're probably, like, hundreds of years old, you know, like a child of the Fae is not like a child, like how we think of children, but in their little assholes. And they need to learn how to stop being little assholes.
Ansel Burch 29:57
I. I mean, when you've got the power to reshape worlds, you know, you really got to make sure everybody's on lock with what's acceptable, right?
Maui 30:09
It's, yeah, it's all about understanding the balance of power and responsibility. Because, like you said, like your wants can, like, fundamentally change the world around you. You can also do the classic, right? Like, defeat the interior conflict, so you can defeat the exterior conflict.
Ansel Burch 30:29
Oh, yeah, I think that's, that's inherent, like, if we, if we go that direction, that's, that's the takeaway, right? Is, is, first we must master ourselves, and then we can go help these other people who are in a situation that we recognize is is problematic, right?
Maui 30:46
Here's this. Here's a community that is under the iron grip of the the the prince of winter, and you know, it's, it's always, it's always winter here, like the spring never comes, because the prince of winter makes it till it's always cold. And you know, he's an arch face, so his wants really, just like overpower everybody else, and no one could get through to him or something like that.
Ansel Burch 31:25
What size of the communities having large cities feels potentially quite difficult. I think that's why those communities that control their children and fit them into a mold do that. They justify it by saying it's the only way this is possible, the only way we can all live in one place like this is if we have this kind of control over who our children become.
Maui 31:48
Well, depending on I think, yes, potentially, that's the thing. But I also think there's something to be said about the places that have figured out how to be community with each other without diminishing each other's individuality. Right? It depends on like, on which of these, like, fake communities are you in, ones that don't get it and ones that do get it right? Because I think it's a very western thing to be like, individual, individual, individual, right? But you have like, a lot of like African modalities of community that are very different, right? It's not about individuality, it's it's I am because we are right. It is learning how to care for others. I actually think that we in this country have a tendency to raise people as sociopaths, and then as we get older, we have to learn empathy. Yeah, you know, it's a great way to put it, and it could be a reflection of that, you know, of like learning, learning to think about more than yourself, right? That that coming of age is also like the realization that the world doesn't revolve around you. We have a question from lobster shrub says, Is there maybe a darker version of the woods where the real psychos wind up when they fail to figure out their shit. Oh, absolutely, absolutely, the Yeah, the something, is
Ansel Burch 33:37
that the desert or the swamp or the or just like the spooky woods, the cursed woods, yeah, like, we live in the, in the, like, pretty, you know, everything's green, and there are, like, Sun dappled groves and stuff. But if you go over there to the dark woods, yeah, there's some, there's some shit going on over there,
Maui 33:59
you hear, it's always Twilight. It's there. It's always midnight. Yes, yeah, you have the Twilight Realm, and then, like the midnight realm, or something like that.
The upside down questions.
Ansel Burch 34:21
The upside down, yeah, yeah, not, not unlike
Maui 34:24
that for legal purposes. We have no idea what we're talking about. But no,
Ansel Burch 34:30
that's okay. I don't think they'll sue us over acknowledging that they're the thing exists and is really very good. I thought, don't go to those woods. They suck.
Yeah, that's right, those woods do suck.
Maui 34:51
Okay, I'm liking the world,
Ansel Burch 34:57
yeah, I think now is when we start talking NPC.
Maui 35:00
Let's, yeah, let's establish a few NPCs, two to three NPCs is what we have here. Okay, we mentioned a couple things already that I think we should just like slot in. We mentioned the queen of spring and the prince of winter. I feel like the the queen of spring. For some reason in my head, like it's like Titania meets the child, like Empress. Yes, you know, somewhere between those two would be cool to have the area with the crash outs be constantly in flux from all the rampant and clashing wants. Yeah, it's, it's like a realm of just like pure wild magics, because they have not learned how to, like, contain their shit. So, yeah, oh God, you got so many like, Wild Magic checks in that area, if they're in there and just have all sorts of crazy shit happen to them. I have a d3 100 Wild Magic table from Dungeon coach, that would be very fun. Oh, great.
Ansel Burch 36:05
Yeah, that'd be a great use. And, yeah, maybe that's the swamp. You know it's, it's not that it's a swamp, because it's like, wet and, and, and, I don't know, brackish or in a tidal basin, or whatever it's it's a swamp because it constantly moves. There's no time for the soil to become solid. Yeah?
Maui 36:31
It Yeah. I think that whatever that space is like, it's not just a swamp, it's not just a desert, it's not just a dark forest, it's all of those things and none of those things, and it's constantly changing.
Ansel Burch 36:44
I think absolutely wanting something together makes it easier to manifest.
Maui 36:49
Oh yeah, absolutely,
Ansel Burch 36:57
1,000,000% Yep,
Maui 37:01
for those of you watching, and thank you so much for watching, I'd love to know if you are enjoying this world building exercise. We're getting so many great ideas from you. I just want because everyone's wet, i
Ansel Burch 37:23
Oh, my goodness Megan thee stallion shows up. Yeah,
Maui 37:27
but yeah. Are you enjoying this? Are you excited to see more from other creators and Dungeon masters and hear about all the different types of worlds people can come up with. Let us know in the chat. Okay, so we have that
Ansel Burch 37:44
we also take suggestions of people that you'd like us to reach out to.
Maui 37:47
Oh, yeah, if you have any favorite, like, haters that you love absolutely, yeah, that'd be great. What do you think of, like, what do you think of a characterization for the Prince of winter?
Ansel Burch 38:00
I think if, if the, if the queen of spring is is the childlike Empress, and we, we want to go with this sort of Fae court. You know, tradition would have the prince of winter be like old and gnarly and gray and mad all the time and cold to each other, to everybody. I think it would be interesting to invert that and have the prince of winter be just as young and childlike as the Queen of spring, but in that like the way that children can be cold, he's just so disinterested in the wants of anybody else that only his wants can matter.
Maui 38:50
Yeah, absolutely. Oh yes. I so much. Enjoyed the sky steampunk setting that we did at the on the pickup conserver. That was so much
Ansel Burch 39:02
fun. Oh, that was
Maui 39:04
no please pepper us with all the questions. We love it. Beanie, thank you for the engagement. We really appreciate it. Yeah, so the prince of winter is basically like a fan of the cure. I i
Ansel Burch 39:26
So, yeah, maybe that's our visual indicator. We go, we go emo for the Prince of winter. Yeah, you know very lots of lots of black, lots of draping, sort of, lots of shadow involved in in both intentionally and just in vibe, whether it's, you know, eye shadow or, you know, just being constantly in the sort of dark corner of the room. Yeah. Oh, unlit throne room.
Maui 40:06
That's hilarious. Oh, in the in terms of the realms, I think there's the Twilight Realm, the midnight realm, I think there's also the sunlight realm,
the sunlight realm. Yeah, sunlight, Twilight, midnight. I like the idea of like various like realm, like realms of light or forests of light. I
it, yeah, absolutely it's funny. So age I I almost never use pre existing material. I always find it more interesting to create my own worlds. And for me, like this, we started by doodling on themes and everything kind of spins out from there. That's kind of usually like, what I like to do, my method is like, Okay, what's the theme of this adventure, this campaign that I want to evoke and then flower it out from there. You know, my wild west campaign that I'm doing right now, it's a bunch of, you know, scumbags trying to be good people, you know. So one of the things I thought of when I was starting on that was regret, like as a theme people that have read in their ledger, to borrow MCU parlance, and what do they need to do to, kind of like, get right with themselves, you know? So, yeah, it just kind of depends on what you want to do. So I'm so happy that this is enjoyable for you. Okay, yeah, so we have, does we have,
Ansel Burch 41:57
by the way, yeah, do
Maui 41:58
we have a third NPC we want for? Oh, sorry, go ahead.
Ansel Burch 42:02
Oh, just that. Just that. I much prefer home brew personally as well. So I feel the same.
Maui 42:08
Do we have a third NPC, like, maybe, like, who's the quest giver of this?
Ansel Burch 42:16
Yeah, I, I don't know that we need a quest giver. I think the queen of spring can be our quest giver, so much as what we need is the we need, our our guide, our wise leader, who leads us into the woods and to the to the to the the gates to the other world, the magical world again, to keep to take it back to the hero's journey. Language, okay, we need our our
Maui 42:57
Obi Wan Kenobi, yeah. Okay. Let me noodle on that for a second while I think about that question for you, are you guys full time in this hobby? Ie gaming, running your channels, etc.
Ansel Burch 43:15
Oh, gosh, no, not at all. No, I have a day job and and a side hustle? Yeah, I would love for this to become a job that brings me sustaining income, but as of yet, I haven't quite made it across that particular root con.
Maui 43:36
I am trying to get to that point myself, but also, I'm not there yet. I'm also a professional Santa. Another thing that I do during the winter season, as well as lobster shrub, who's in the chat, is also another wonderful Chicagoland professional Santa. Yeah, I'm doing a big push this year in 2026 to really try and up the production scale of like what I do on this channel. I have a big dragon rider campaign that I'm going to be running that will have tie in audio dramas and offshoot mini series and whatnot. They're set in the same world, actually, as my wild west campaign. So I'm very excited about that, and yeah, gonna launch the Patreon very soon and really try and get it going so that if it can't sustain me, can at least be something supplemental. But really it's mostly for the love of the game. I just love storytelling with role playing games as a as an entry into that world.
Ansel Burch 44:45
Yeah, it's a, it's a compulsion.
Maui 44:48
Yeah, seriously for me? Well, yeah, good old forever. DMS here.
Ansel Burch 44:55
Okay, all right, so we got to keep this moving. Yes, we're already, yeah, I. Who do we think is our guide?
Maui 45:03
You mentioned Obi Wan Kenobi. I'm thinking less of a, I think they're all fake, but I think this particular person is very old, like, more of a, like, tree spirit, kind of vibe is kind of what I'm seeing in my mind, Elm or ash, the kind of the woods that kind of come to my mind out of the gate.
Ansel Burch 45:34
Yeah. I like, I like Ash a lot. Yeah, that's that's got, like, that's got existing warm, fuzzy associations for me as a Western European person. So, yeah, I can, I can get behind ash, okay, perhaps my ancestors would be happy with that.
Maui 45:59
Perhaps he's the one. He is the Fae that doesn't want for anything. He just takes, he just helps, take people on trips and like, why don't you want for anything? Because I have everything that I want. Like, I realized that, like, I have all the things. So now I just kind of help people out, take them on trips into the forest to find themselves and see what that means for them.
Ansel Burch 46:34
What if he's the one who alerts them to the the Empire, to the prince of winters plot that could be. You know he already lives in the forest of want,
and you know he's aware of what's going on and finds our heroes as they are beginning their sort of quest of self discovery. And maybe there's a lot of power in in you when you first go into this. And so he wants to sort of use that power to sort of push towards making a real change in the prince of winter's dominions.
Maui 47:26
I have, I have an idea. Go on. The reveal is that Ash is the king of seasons, and he actually does have one last wand, and that is to help his son, the prince of winter.
Ansel Burch 47:49
Oh, oh, okay, I like this. So hold on, back up. Then, if we're gonna, if we're gonna do that, is the queen of spring, actually, the princess of spring.
Maui 47:59
Princesses for his children, exactly. Yep, yeah, the four seasons are like the princes and princesses of the various seasons. There's also, I'm sure, like the the the monarch of I'll try to think of what the non binary term is for a prince or princess, but sovereign, yeah, the sovereign of a fall and then somebody a summer, yeah, there's like, the autumn sovereign, yeah, yeah. I love that.
Ansel Burch 48:40
Anyway, the summer, somebody, yeah, not appearing in this film. This is good. This is good. Okay, so let's talk a little bit about locations, that maps and Okay, so do you think there's anything else we need to cover here? No, I think
Maui 48:56
that's good. So, so in the regular format of this. What we just did, that's an episode we would, in the first episode, establish the world, the themes and the NPCs. So we've done that. So we're now heading into the second episode, which would be a maps and locations, so key locations for the story, governments and boundaries, and then choose the main location. And the nice thing about this is, as you flower out the world, you start to have a lot of that stuff already. I look right here, I see we already have magical forest. We have the Twilight, midnight and sunlight realms like we already have a lot of key locations kind of created. We've also have a bit of the structure of the government with the four Fae sovereigns of the seasons. So we've kind of, we already have a lot of that stuff. Yeah, we can give each of them different like names, the sunlit coast, the twilight forest, the midnight. Uh, the midnight, uh, horror, you know, like we could give each of them kind of different kind of names,
the midnight wastes.
Ansel Burch 50:14
Ooh, there we go. Yeah,
Maui 50:18
yeah, that's tasty, yeah. I might steal some of this and toss a couple of these locations in Galdoria. I love the midnight waste is very evocative.
Ansel Burch 50:28
Heck, this, this can be your whole fare realm.
Maui 50:32
Oh, my God. Oh, my God, maybe. Yep, shit. I was just thinking that I need to have a Fay realm that is overseen by Mindy, the god of tricks and secrets. So, yeah, I might this, might get this might get a retrofitted, if to Galleria, because I'm loving this.
Ansel Burch 50:53
Stolen wholesale. There is
Maui 50:55
stolen from ourselves. Yep, there. That's another world building tip, everybody steal liberally.
Ansel Burch 51:05
Use your own shit. And you know, chances are good your players haven't read that book that you read in sixth grade that is still burned into your brain. So, yep, use it
Maui 51:14
and re skin things too, right? Like, oh, I have a stat block here that's perfect. But just like re skin it to fit into your world like, that's one of the easiest things to do. Midnight wastes make me wonder what a post apocalyptic fade realm setting would look like. That's what the midnight the midnight waste is. Yeah, that's, that's definitely it. Post Apocalyptic face chic. So I think for what we're doing, this is probably a community in the in the twilight forest in the high fantasy core area. Oh, for sure. So chat, why don't you give us the name of the community in the twilight forest, the small fey town in which this starts.
Ansel Burch 52:03
It's one of many such enclaves, right? So it's got to be like the something Grove, or the something clearing, or the, you know,
Alder grove. You wanted Alder earlier, right?
Maui 52:24
I said ash or elm, or the two that I said elm. I do love alder. Actually have a character that I'm playing in a upcoming one shot that's named alder. He's like, he's the the tree Pope, basically, I say I'm not alders, yeah, Petrichor just hopes. Grove, another one from age of adventure. That's a really good one. Then Petra core was another one I came up with. Look at that. We got three locations. Petricor, yeah, hell yeah. Let's start this in hopes, Grove, that would be our starting locale, the alders. I like the putting the article in front of it, the alders and that the alders, that's the questing forest, that's where Ash, like takes young, crazy Fae for their rum spring or whatever the fuck. And Petra Coria is that place that isn't doing great, that is like doing the thing wrong
Ansel Burch 53:44
that you were oh so Petrachoria is in the midnight wastes,
Maui 53:47
yeah, that's that, yeah. Maybe that's like a community on the outskirts of the Midnight wastes, yeah,
Ansel Burch 53:57
that is overseen by this despotic boy king, hell yeah. Is is the antagonist of Petra Coria? Is that our winter Prince, or is it a child who shares aspects with the winter Prince? Do we think we put them against the arch, face themself?
Maui 54:21
I think for simplicity sake, you make those two things one of the same, right for one shot length. The the petulant boy in petricoria is the prince of winter who's forgotten himself. Oh so, so consumed by want. Is he that he's like, he's just kind of turned into, like, this petulant child. I kind of like the idea of a little bit of that, kind of like Miyazaki, like weirdness, a little bit more like fairy tale version in this world. Have you heard of. This new RPG system called Dolmanwood.
Ansel Burch 55:05
Yeah, I have actually, I met the guy who created Dolman wood by total accident. Oh, my God, at PAX on Pax unplugged. We just happened to be next to each other on the train, and I was like, Are you going to PAX? He was like, Yeah, I'm going to PAX. I was like, What are you doing? He's demoing a game I ran, I created. I was like, me too. His is, you know, three games or three books long, and has a, you know, real publishing contract, which I'm very jealous of. Good work, sir, for sure. But he was delightful.
Maui 55:38
Oh, that's wonderful to hear. We have, oh, first time chatter. Hi, anarchy in the USA. That's a great name. First of all, want. Want is out here, consuming princess. Oh, god, that's dark. I love it. Hell, yeah, yeah.
Ansel Burch 56:02
Maybe that's how he recite, like they stay young, is there's like a cycle, maybe the want consumes them,
Maui 56:10
yeah, yeah, could be Yeah, yeah.
Ansel Burch 56:19
Was a great line.
Maui 56:22
Oh, thank you. Yeah, I think that. Like, if that emotional state can change the world around you, you can also change yourself, right? So, like, if you were so consumed by want you, like you actually become this petulant child, potentially, if it goes even further out of control than that, maybe it's just turns into, like, a rage monster, you know, think of like, no face and in a spirited way, right when he's, like, eating everything and like, turned into this huge monster. The want, yeah? He like it went. When he's completely consumed by it, he becomes the want. And that's your big bad. Oh, I love that.
Ansel Burch 57:08
Yeah, once the generation, we must defeat the want.
Yeah, this is good. I
Maui 57:20
like, this is very good. This is definitely everybody you were helping contribute to the favorite album of my world. This is exciting. Did not go into this thinking that, but now I'm like, Oh, this is freaking Perfect. Okay, okay, so, man, we are cooking really fast. Like, this is kind of awesome having, like, the chat
Ansel Burch 57:46
helping as well. Yeah, I like it. I'm here
Maui 57:49
for this, yeah. Like, we might have to rethink our formatting, because, like, doing this live and having people in the chat, like, Cooking With Us is really fun.
Ansel Burch 57:56
It's definitely a lovely treat.
Maui 58:01
It is, yeah, it's a little, it's a little Sousa of goodness. So we have our locations and regions, govern governments and boundaries. Oh, I love that font you did for the wants.
Ansel Burch 58:19
Finally make it onto the screen where we can see it.
Maui 58:22
There we go. Here I could, I could always scroll out some more so we could see how big this is getting.
You mean, we get to be part the real society was the friends we made along the way. Anarchy.
And I think that is that is kind of the secret of the world builder society, is that all of your world builders, every time you have a daydream or a flight of fancy, you've built a world, and it exists somewhere out there in the realms of imagination.
And that's how you talk when you become a freaking DM forever,
Ansel Burch 59:18
yep, Oh God, I was just reading never whistle at night, and there's a First Nations monster that is all about this, want.
Maui 59:32
Oh, the Wendigo. Wendigo has endless hunger.
Ansel Burch 59:40
Wendigo is part of it? Yeah, it's definitely got shades of Wendy go, yeah.
Maui 59:44
It has turned to some weird, freaking, like massive, like anthropomorphic entity of some sort, yeah. That is a great idea. Beanie would be rad as hell to. Eventually have a compendium of all the world's built. Oh yeah, that's very cool. An Explorer's guide to the multiverse. Oh my gosh,
Ansel Burch 1:00:10
yeah, we should, we should put that on the website.
Maui 1:00:13
Yes, absolutely. That's a great idea. Beanie, okay, governments and boundaries, I feel like we have the boundaries with the various like, the regions would be the boundaries, right?
Ansel Burch 1:00:30
Yeah, the realms definitely have, and I think they're probably more Venn diagrams than they are boundaries. Like there's got to be, you know, the sort of in between places where these shift from one to the next.
Maui 1:00:45
So we have the boundaries. Anything else about the government that is important for this, that we need for this, I don't know that there's anything else.
Ansel Burch 1:00:58
I don't know that we need to over complicate that? I don't think so either. You know, we've got this sort of this, this monarchy situation set up, and we know, we know that the different realms are the Yeah, I think we've covered it. I think we've covered it. I and we've got our main location, hopes grove. Should we come up with a few special things about hopes grove?
Maui 1:01:34
Hopes Grove, I feel like hopes Grove is pretty, like idyllic, like fake community.
That'll be my contribution to that. It's like, it's very like idyllic, and like everybody's happy. What about you?
Ansel Burch 1:01:59
I think I will concretize that a little bit and say that they have a grand feasting hall built into the bows of the forest, which is, you know, it symbolizes the way that this community comes together and finds consensus in order to maintain their their social order.
Maui 1:02:36
All are welcome at the table at the feast of hmm, I will toss in that there is no one leader in in this fake community. It is. It's a true commune where it kind of everybody kind of chips in, like they've learned to to synchronize their wants, which is why, like, right, like, they're not synchronizing, but like, how to, like, coexist in their want. And that's why this is such a prosperous town,
Ansel Burch 1:03:18
yeah, and I'll just say it, I think that they've learned that their want has to be in balance with the world's wants. Yeah, also gives, gives more, more space and abundance.
Maui 1:03:32
What does the average day look like for an average fey in hopes Grove, oh,
Ansel Burch 1:03:38
that's a great question. I'm tempted to, like, take it into a super whimsical direction and be like, Yeah, well, I mean, somebody's got to put the leaves on the trees and paint the flowers those colors, you know, take it all the way back to, like, Shakespearean fairies. And I don't hate that idea. I kind of love that there's
Maui 1:04:07
like, maybe that's how, maybe, and maybe that's how, like, seasons change in the real world, right? Like in the in the Mortal Realm, right? Like they paint the leaves and as autumn comes around, they pluck the leaves to create garbage for themselves for for the coming winter. And that's when the leaves fall off the trees.
Ansel Burch 1:04:35
Well, but hopes grow. It's not winter, you know? It's it. This is a perpetual season.
Maui 1:04:40
It is. It is always kind of the same thing. But like, they still put on, they still, like, pick leaves to, like, put on his clothes or whatever, for sure, yeah,
Ansel Burch 1:04:53
because hopes Grove is spring, right? Is what we
Maui 1:04:56
decided hopes Grove would be under the realm of Princess of spring.
Ansel Burch 1:05:00
Right territory, yeah, yeah. So they're probably doing, like, painting flower tops and sprinkling dew, yeah.
Maui 1:05:13
Like, maybe, like, they like, pick the leaves to give to like, and send it to the people in the winter, in the winter realms, or
Ansel Burch 1:05:21
something like, oh, it's like, as, like, care packages, yeah, we
Maui 1:05:25
picked these leaves for you. And they're like, Fuck your leaves.
Ansel Burch 1:05:29
They're all wearing, like, pine cone armor,
Maui 1:05:35
like it like they say, like, I see your red leaves, and I want to paint them black. Ah. I wish I could laugh right now.
Ansel Burch 1:05:48
Oh, that's so good. Yes, sold. Do people have specialties or niches in their ability to want that's a good question. I mean, I would wager that they must do but I wonder if it's as organized as that, or if it's just like,
Maui 1:06:08
it's like, weavers, dancers, singers, like, I've like, that's as like, I think niche is it gets in their abilities, right? Like, is like, how does it manifest, like, how do they manifest their abilities? How do they display their feats of magic? Oh, yeah, painters, you know, it's very artisanal in that way. I feel like, in terms of the regions, we only have three, but there's four people, so there needs to be, like, a four, three region.
Ansel Burch 1:06:45
It's off camera, but it's worth,
Maui 1:06:47
it's worth knowing what it like the, like, the midday kingdom, or something like that, like, you know, like when the the sun is its highest in the sky, kind of thing, like the sunlit coast is maybe, the sunlit coast is that maybe, like, there's like, like, the cliffs of dawn, or something like that, yeah,
Ansel Burch 1:07:10
the cliffs of dawn, it's got to be, yeah, on the on the opposite side of the sea from the sunlit coast. As the sun rises, it's the cliffs of dawn, yeah,
Maui 1:07:20
little Cliffs of Dover shout out, yep, yep,
yep. I love this world. Oh my gosh. This is so good.
Ansel Burch 1:07:38
We're gonna be coming back here. I can just smell it. Oh yeah. Okay, Hope's Grove got it. What else is special about hopes grove? Like, are there any other buildings or key elements? And I guess we don't have to do too much about it, since we're gonna forget it and go into the forests anyway. But it might be good to have, like, one or two other key things that the that would come back to our characters as they remember
Maui 1:08:11
beating answer your question, I think, is the question is, is everything wanted into existence, or do they build houses, grow crops, etc? And I think that that's like, that's what they that's why you have these artisanal magic makers, right? So if that person is a singer, they sing their their house into existence, like their dream house into existence. There's probably also how two people, like, two people to Fay that fall in love, that would have a kid like, it would be like the marriage of their two expressions of art and love, you know, so like two people like dance together and create, and from that a new phase is created, or something like that. You know, is there a reason anybody would want to leave that isn't an external threat? Depends on what their want is, I suppose,
Ansel Burch 1:09:20
like injury, it would come down to, like a want that is out of sync with the
Maui 1:09:25
community, right? It's like everything's idyllic here. I want adventure. I want more. And so they, they want to leave. And that's when they that's when Ash says, All right, it's time to take a trip into the forest and see what. See what you find. Maybe some people find that they don't actually want to be here in hopes Grove and they never come back.
Ansel Burch 1:09:47
That's who our players are. Yeah, that's their adventurers. They want something beyond hopes Grove,
Maui 1:09:57
and some people go out have a grand adventure. Her, and they come back and they're like, that was enough. And some people keep finding adventures. And the cool thing is, I think what they realized in the end, like, oh, I created this adventure because I wanted it.
Ansel Burch 1:10:16
I wanted there to be a cool place for me to go off an adventure. So the dungeon is just manifested in front of you, yeah? Uh, it's, it's Agatha all along. Yeah. Sorry, spoilers.
Maui 1:10:37
Okay, um, it.
Ansel Burch 1:10:44
What else that might be, everything for this bit of the format, I
Maui 1:10:49
think so we have our main location, we cooked. We have our government. We have our boundaries. We'll move on to our last part, which is our session, Prop,
Ansel Burch 1:11:02
the world builders society is a co production of indecisionist Productions and reflect games. Find the indecisionist on all of the social media platforms I can be bothered to be on and check out some of my other amazing podcasts and TTRPG pickup con, a free monthly event going on@ttrpgpickupcon.com at TTRPG, pickupcon.com find Maui at reflect games and check out the weekly live streams and incredible gaming content at reflect games on twitch.tv/reflect. Games. Find out more about the world builders society at indecisionist.com/world builders.
