Having crafted the world, region or area where the story
takes places as much as you feel comfortable with, and having listed the kingdoms and empires that are of some
import to your story, we need to examine the climate of your world.
Climate will play a major part in your world, even if only
mentioned in a paragraph or two for setting. However, that paragraph can be a
compelling one, which establishes and enhances the story.
Before the cries of protest arise, I am aware that Star Wars
has both desert and snow worlds, and that there are supposedly native living
creatures on these worlds. Moreover, if
we look at the fictional history of Tatooine; it once had large oceans full of
marine life and a world-spanning jungle, but this biosphere was destroyed when
the Rakata razed the planet, drying up its riverbeds and boiling away its
oceans.
Granted that there are probably other forms of life than
what we are used to, but this world had an ocean and jungle both gone, removed
leaving a desert planet.
If we are too assume that the life on Tatooine prior to the
destruction of the world, was a carbon/hydrogen life from much like Earths,
then the removal of the vast forest which presumably removed the carbon-dioxide
and granted oxygen to the world, since when we first see it in the movies
people are breathing with no external devices.
I know it is nit-picking but
without trees on Tatooine to help reduce erosion and moderate the climate the
world should be unable to sustain any large creatures. Trees also remove carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere and store large quantities of carbon in their
tissues. Trees and forests provide a habitat for many species of animals and plants,
which in turn provide links in the food chain. Tropical rainforests are one of
the most bio diverse habitats in the world. Trees also provide shade and
shelter, timber for construction, fuel for cooking and heating, and fruit for
food. All these things are absent from Tatooine.
The lost oceans on Tatooine reduce the rainfall that helps
generate a weather pattern that can sustain life, as we know it, and presumably,
what had been on the planet prior to the loss of both the oceans and the
forests.
Climate plays a large part in your world, and different
climates will affect the people, kingdoms as well as flora and fauna that are
in those regions. Climate is something that many writers take for granted but
fail to make the connection between their world setting, the regional climate
and the peoples living in that region.
When developing your world, you need not be a meteorologist,
but you should look at the various continents on Earth and see how rainfall and
climate create biodiversity in those regions. How people and animals deal with
droughts, snowfall, tsunamis and other dynamic weather effects.
If you are building a civilization based on the Aztec, then
they would much different from a civilization based on the Vikings or the
Mongols. Climate and weather patterns
shaped each of these civilizations, in terms of what they hunted or grew for
food. How they dressed, how they armed themselves and how they built their
structures. Climate also plays a role in population size. If your civilization
has the ability to generate farmlands and grow a good deal of their food,
supplementing it with domesticated animals the population can be larger. However,
if the farming season is short, and winters long and hunting a greater
component than reliance on domesticated animals is, the population tends to be
smaller.
When building your fictional empires and kingdoms not only
is their location important but also understanding the climate they reside in
will help you create more vivid images when describing the journey your heroes
make. A mountain kingdom on the western slopes will be much different than a
kingdom on an inland sea near the equator.
