Build a world

A world is like a Codex that lives outside any book: a map of the characters, places, things and ideas your stories share, and how they connect. Open Worlds from the library shelf to create one before you write a word, or alongside a manuscript. One world can hold many books.

Choose or start a world

Worlds shows each of your worlds as a card, with how many entries it holds and the books set in it. Click a card to open the world, or ＋ New world to start one. A new world opens on its settings, so you can name it first.

Work on the map

A world opens on its map, and everything about it is done there, the same way as on a book's Story map:

• Add an entry: choose ＋ New entry, or double-click an empty part of the map to put it there. Pick a character, place, thing or note and give it a name.
• Edit an entry: click it to open its card. Change its name and details, choose a picture, or Delete entry, which also removes its connections.
• Connect two entries: drag from one entry to another, or choose Link to… on its card, and say what the connection is: rules, is allied with, lives in. Drag from an entry into empty space to make a new entry already connected to it.
• Find an entry: type in the search box at the top of the map.
• Drag an entry to pin it where you want it.

← All worlds takes you back to your worlds.

World settings

World settings, at the top of the map, holds the world's name and description and the books and series set in it. A linked book shows the world's entries in its Codex and on its Story map, and drafting uses them like the book's own entries. Edit an entry once, in the world, and every linked book sees the change. Unlinking keeps both the world and the book.

Archive world leaves it out of its books without deleting it. Archived worlds are listed under Archived worlds, and Restore world brings one back.

Start a world from a book

If you built your world inside a book's Codex first, share it so other books can be set in it too. Choose Share as a world on the book's Story map, or in its Codex.

• Every entry in the book's own Codex moves into a new world named after the book, with its connections and where you pinned them. The book is linked to the world, so nothing disappears from it.
• From then on the entries are edited in Worlds, once, and every book set in the world sees the change.
• Characters go into the world too, and the book keeps them in its cast, with their portraits and voices. In that book you go on editing them in its cast.
• If the world cannot be saved, nothing moves and the book's Codex stays as it was.

Ask the world assistant

The assistant floats over the world's map, and over the Story map of any book set in the world. Ask it about the world or a linked book, or ask it to suggest new entries, changes, or connections. Each suggestion is a card you accept or reject; nothing changes until you accept it, and an accepted change can be undone from its card while nothing has changed since. It can also suggest chapter plans and passage rewrites for a linked book; those open in the book's own review, with its History.