The Encyclopedia Arcane

Self-Published

Community Rating

Description

This is not a story.

There is no villain to overcome, there is no hero to root for.

There is no plot, there are no characters.

What there is, is a world. A world with its own history, its own rules, its own magic. If what you love about fantasy is seeing fascinating ideas explored, seeing cool new races and hearing about fantastical locations, this is the work for you. If you enjoy reading setting books for fun, or speculating just what kind of crazy biology must be going on for dragons to be able to cross-breed with essentially every species under the sun, this may be just what you're looking for.

The Encyclopedia Arcane will explore justwhythere are so many hundreds of elven races (and just why they're all so superhumanly beautiful and immortal), how exactly the different planes of reality are connected, what truly underpins magic and why so many spells fail upon the death of their creator, and what the scale-mines of Everquake are harvesting.

This is set in its own setting; it is not intended to be any one world (other than my own), and I will be doing some things quite differently than other stories, but ideally notsodifferent it feels totally alien.

Information

Status: Hiatus
Year: 2022
Author: NorskDaedalus

Royal Road Stats

Rating: 4.8/ 5.0
Followers: 531
Views: 138,058

Reviews

No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts!

Community Reviews(7)

OneWanderingRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
...I'm making an exception.
THIS isn't a story. It's a crystallization of thought on a system of spellcrafting. One of a depth and breadth the likes of which I never seen - with the possible exception of a couple of professionally published game designers.
I've been playing RPGs since September of 1974. I played twice a week for 40 years... and in some amazing campaigns (you've never heard of most of them, except perhaps Lee Gold's Chivalry & Sorcery). Sadly, less often the last 8 years... poor health.
Not to discourage our author' fiction work, but he should be using this to create a game for publication. Even those portions written as "flavor text" indicate a clarity of thought not normally found in published games. I'd certainly buy it; even on a retiree's income.
Bluelightning42Royal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
I'm sold. Let's go!
One of my favorite parts of fantasy stories (worldbuilding) is being dissected and explored in more detail than I've ever had a chance to enjoy before.
You really have to read the blurb there's not much more I can say that hasn't been said there. This isn't a typical story. It's high quality worldbuilding for worldbuildings sake and nothing else.
There's only one chapter out of the time of me writing this, but the magic system and world in norsk's other story 'the way ahead' can attribute to the quality going forward.
Tribuo GrimmRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
NorskDaedalus has always been solid at world building, and that's what this is. So far there are hints of interesting connections between different aspects of the world, much like you would see in the real world. The voice of the narrator is not omniscient and does have a bit of personality, making the reading more interesting and not dry.
At it's core, the Encyclopedia Arcane details a unique world, similar to some fantastical worlds, yet utterly individual among peers. I look forward to more!
auramasdaRoyal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
This encyclopedia is a great example of an extremely solid world building and lore building, great attention tho the detail without be too boring. The style is very intersting, very different from a normal encyclopedia, even if is very detailed is more like a passionate researcher, which I think is a good thing. I'll wait new argument.
1Royal Road
★★★★★ 5.0
This work is exactly what it claims to be, no more, no less. Pure, raw, unfiltered worldbuilding, a realm of fantasy dissected and described. The prose is strong, and detail is clear. As information builds upon itself, a world is formed, like a blurred image slowly focusing. I love it.
I hope you enjoy The Encyclopedia Arcane!
SobekhotepRoyal Road
★★★★★ 4.5
I often get dissapointed by fantasy or sci-fi works because they don't have enough worldbuilding in them, so this work has been a welcome surprise since it's just worldbuilding, and extremely detailed at that.
It covers a variety of topics and the entries are written in somewhat different styles, as they are from different in universe books, which is a nice touch. Personally, I was most interested reading about the more grounded elements - such as golem construction and the city of Ikraish - and didn't care too much for the chapters on various realms, how reality functions, and other such esoteric matters, but that's just my personal preferences, everyone would probably find something that they like in this compendium.
NarraRoyal Road
★★★★ 4.0
I'd have read this series more if it were more original, but it feels like I'm reading a mishmash of tired dnd stuff. I skimmed further chapters a bit and it's the same, there are minor twists and originality here and there, but it's largely the same stuff as traditional fantasy and mythologies it seems. The presentation is different than usual though. Maybe I'm just over immersed in fantasy stuff.