Worldlines

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WORLDLINES

What are Worldlines?

Worldlines are the in-universe name for a character's home setting. From the perspective of the characters, Worldlines are parallel universes with radical differences, operating on entirely different rules and logic from each other. One character might come from an entirely mundane Worldline without any magic or paranormal elements and another might come from a Worldline where ghosts, ghouls and goblins are part of every day life. Typically, Worldlines do not cross over or interact with each or, nor is it usually possible for people to view or cross over to other Worldlines – the technology of Lumen Omega is an exception in this regard.

From an OOC perspective, Worldlines are essentially individual genres and stories.

Hold up, you said this wasn't a fourth wall thing!

It's not, I promise. 'Genre' and 'stories' are just the most direct words to get across the general Vibe to shoot for when constructing a character's Worldline. Just as genres and stories each operate on their own unique logic, so too do Worldlines – a magical girl story might have the day saved by the power of love and friendship, but a horror story relying on those same ideas would probably come to a bloody end.

Since WorldExo is at least partially about recreating the fun of unusual crosscanon CR with purely OCs, players are encouraged to lean heavily on genre and existing canon pastiche when whipping up a character or a Worldline for WorldExo.

So how do I create a Worldline?

It's pretty simple! A Worldline is a character's home setting, so if you have a character written up then you probably already have the bones of a good Worldline ready to go. Once you have all the rest settled, you will need to decide on some additional things: Influence and Aspects.

Influence is just a list of genre and canon inspirations that make up your Worldline. If you're trying to get across a particular Vibe, this is where you lay it out in plain terms to communicate exactly what feel your Worldline has.

Aspects are a little more complicated. In short, these are the rules or logic that your Worldline operates on, potentially unique from its Influence. A Worldline's Aspects may also have knock-on effects on a character and the way they interact with other Worldlines – but since Aspects are such a large part of gameplay, they have their own page here that you should check out.

Do all Worldlines have Aspects?

Yes, they do. However, not all will be immediately obvious – part of the investigation into each new Worldline will have a sort of subquest of deducing the Aspects of each world, therefore identifying its internal logic and how best to resolve whatever issue is at hand.

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