Questions tagged [urban-fantasy]
Questions for incorporating fantastical elements into the modern world (20th century or later), with an emphasis on cities.
116
questions
18
votes
12
answers
6k
views
How would zombies affect trench warfare?
After thousands of years the mightiest of magic uses have finally cracked the code to revive the dead... Kind of. The resurrection spell, while restoring the body to a basic capacity, leaves them a ...
- 6,515
5
votes
4
answers
733
views
Can my city be full of giant rats?
The rodents of unusual size in question are not implausibly large from a biological standpoint, being roughly the same weight as an American Beaver, but much more adapted for land living and with an ...
- 11.4k
2
votes
5
answers
193
views
What sorts of media would a secret subculture of immortals most prominently produce?
Vampires, werewolves, elves, dwarves, merfolk and all manner of other magical creatures, collectively known as "immortals" due to their eternal youth and immunity to disease, secretly live ...
- 7,463
4
votes
6
answers
1k
views
In an Urban Fantasy Setting, Why Would a Magical Courier Be Hired Over Traditional Couriers? [closed]
The premise is that there's a guild of couriers that use a dangerous parallel spirit world for shortcuts through mortal space to deliver packages at great speed.
Despite the advantage of speed, why ...
- 275
-1
votes
2
answers
190
views
What level of Endurance does a player have to have to shrug off a 9mm round from a pistol? [closed]
Weird one, but here we go.
Setting:
-A modern world, with the same laws of physics/same materials, weapons, etc.
-The player is a normal human. Think baseline average American citizen that has a ...
- 539
17
votes
8
answers
2k
views
What would be the best area of medicine for a doctor that moonlights in fighting evil to specialize their career in to deal with unexplained absences?
I have a character who is involved in the typical, secretive supernatural shenanigans of my setting (think something like a superhero, a monster hunter, or the vampires in Vampire: The Masquerade) but ...
- 13.7k
0
votes
1
answer
177
views
How would technology differ in a society with different intelligent species than just humans?
In my story, Longhorn, there’s five races descended from five gods of the same names, which consist of humans, keratas (anthropomorphic big cats w horns) lykos (anthropomorphic Wolf/hyena creatures) ...
18
votes
4
answers
1k
views
What is the earliest point in human history that gold could be hoarded?
I am currently brainstorming the history and logistics of the dragon species in my urban fantasy story about immortal mythical creatures. The way I currently envision them, dragons have their ...
- 7,463
5
votes
2
answers
156
views
How much does my potioneer have to dilute her potions before she can be confident her customers aren't spiking drinks with them? [closed]
In my setting, potions are created by boiling magically-imbued plant and animal matter and exposing it to a soul gem, which is the crystalized MANA (magical DNA) of a dead magical creature. The ...
- 7,463
26
votes
12
answers
4k
views
Best way to smell-proof a revolver in 1998?
My heroine, a wandering loner living a nomadic lifestyle traveling across 1998's western US in an RV, is a supernatural being, known as an immortal, with a great many useful powers. However, none of ...
- 7,463
24
votes
19
answers
8k
views
Why can't immortals use the "make humans ignore this" symbol as an invisibility cloak?
My setting involves a masquerade (though in this setting the term used is "The Veil of Ignorance") where numerous immortal humanoid beings live in secret amongst humanity as a 1-in-1000 ...
- 7,463
16
votes
13
answers
5k
views
Why would vampires sire vampires of lesser blood than they have to?
Long story short: my story has magical humanoids (known as "immortals" due to their immunity to old age and disease) existing in secret on mostly-modern-day Earth as a 1-in-1000-humans ...
- 7,463
8
votes
7
answers
570
views
What would have been the most infamous "Reaper's Moon" in history?
My story is an urban fantasy tale, set on an alternate Earth where every mythical humanoid that humanity ever thought was real, is in fact real, or at least used to be before going extinct. From ...
- 7,463
22
votes
29
answers
7k
views
What modern-day object could a magic wand be disguised as?
In my setting, wands and staves are two of the many means by which magical creatures can harness, to a limited degree, other magical creatures' powers. When a magical creature (known as an immortal) ...
- 7,463
21
votes
12
answers
6k
views
How would the world governments define a super person?
DC, Marvel, X-men...etc style people, or things, exist. Great.
Now the existence of those people would definitely change laws and many legal practices. And of course the governments of the world would ...
- 8,242
3
votes
5
answers
167
views
What would be the ideal date and time for a magical zombie apocalypse to occur to cause the most death and destruction?
An invisible eldritch entity has enveloped the entirety of modern planet Earth. As a result of this, any human who dies becomes a zombie. This is not spread by bites or anything like that, death of ...
- 964
4
votes
6
answers
1k
views
What would be US Military procedure for investigating a portal to another world? [closed]
Here's the scenario I'm working with: a portal opens up within 30 minutes' drive of one of the better equipped military installations in the continental United States. It is stable, shows no signs of ...
- 287
3
votes
4
answers
856
views
How realistic would a city of over ten million people in an area of less than 100 square kilometres be?
I have been playing Cyberpunk 2077 on my PS4 and Night City in the game has almost 7 million people and an area of just 75 km2. It is very dense with suspended streets and highways and giant buildings ...
- 1,889
3
votes
2
answers
126
views
How would a city work to accommodate much larger and smaller humanoids? [duplicate]
In my story there's a rather highly populated city with multiple humanoid creatures with varying heights. I'm not sure how much this would matter, but the most common species in the city are humans ...
- 1,111
5
votes
2
answers
200
views
How, if at all, could my secret immortal clans hold on to territory in small towns?
I have a story set in an alternate version of 1998 USA where nearly every single mythical humanoid humanity has ever believed in actually does exist (or used to before going extinct) and lives in ...
- 7,463
6
votes
3
answers
280
views
How can ungulate humanoids conceal their weird legs in public?
In my story, mythical humanoids secretly live amongst humanity in modern day, but not all of them are created equal when it comes to blending in with the human race. While individual humans do know ...
- 7,463
6
votes
3
answers
1k
views
How durable would a kaiju-sized human be?
I am writing a story that centres around a person who slowly grows larger and larger overtime, to the point of kaiju-size and beyond. They grow due to magic, so other than their vastly increased size ...
- 203
0
votes
1
answer
143
views
How does a government handle a large number of people disappearing that are anticipated to return all at once at some point in the future
I have a world I had toyed with where our world is invaded by creatures very vaguely like the heartless from kingdomhearts. The creatures are mostly immune to traditional weapons, as regular matter ...
- 33k
6
votes
4
answers
318
views
How can supernatural social beings avoid total extermination/enslavement when the human world has the Big Brother system?
The human world has the world government (and thus the single Big Brother system, which monitors people living even in the most obscure places).
For sake of being short I will call "supernatural ...
- 1,938
23
votes
19
answers
6k
views
How do the inhabitants of my city-wide death trap figure out that nobody will be let out until only 100 people are left alive?
So, in my story, there is a city that gets cut off from the rest of the world. Golden translucent walls rise up on all four sides, going all the way up into the atmosphere and all the way down to the ...
- 5,121
3
votes
3
answers
123
views
Why doesn't my memory-manipulating illuminati routinely sweep new species for immunity to their mind control? [closed]
My story is set in the late 90s, in an alternate reality where elves, dwarves, vampires, werewolves and the like all secretly live amongst the human race. Initially the masquerade trope is played ...
- 7,463
6
votes
5
answers
1k
views
How can I plausibly justify why a secret society of superhumans didn't get openly involved in the political events of the 2020s? [closed]
I have a setting that is intended to be set in the "present day" (i.e., whenever the reader is reading it) set in the United States which involves a secret society of supernatural people ...
- 13.7k
3
votes
2
answers
479
views
Seating in Integrated Cities - Not all humans, different species
Okay, so, I have different species than the ones for, well, most of my questions (This is the first question of the series), but the purpose is still here. However, it's on an alien planet, called ...
- 1,147
12
votes
7
answers
3k
views
How powerful could a person with superpowers/group of superhumans be without greatly affecting world history?
One of the major problems I've always had with the MCU and the DC universe is how powerful many of the beings or people are whilst the World is still almost the same as ours.
It was as if the writers ...
- 392
18
votes
8
answers
6k
views
How can a 15-year-old vampire get human blood?
Since they can't really work a job that would allow easy access to blood, I thought of having them volunteer at a blood bank then maybe steal a bag. Alternatively, is it plausible that they would come ...
12
votes
18
answers
8k
views
Is it realistic for a town to completely disappear overnight without a major crisis and massive cultural/historical impacts?
I was inspired by this question which talks about feuding clans of immortals in an urban fantasy setting trying to wipe out each other's cities while under a masquerade. There's a lot of this kind of ...
- 13.7k
6
votes
5
answers
636
views
How could my secret societies of immortals take over rival-clan-controlled towns without breaking the masquerade?
In a previous question, I brought up the concept of sanctuary towns, towns populated entirely by people who know about the population of immortal (as in they can't get old or sick; they can still be ...
- 7,463
2
votes
3
answers
228
views
Is it possible for a group of supernatural beings attempt to declare an independent, sovereign state from within the U.S [closed]
I had previously asked this question about how the U.S. military would deal with a secessionist uprising from an organized coalition of werewolves, when I realized I hadn't thought very much about the ...
- 13.7k
7
votes
6
answers
1k
views
What would be the best city in the U.S./Canada to live in for a supernatural being trying to exist undetected from humanity?
I am wondering if there are any specific cities on the North American continent (not considering Mexico for the moment being, for reasons detailed below) that supernatural beings trying to live hidden ...
- 13.7k
4
votes
2
answers
196
views
21st Century Intracity Train Design with These Races
Link To Races: Rail Transportation with Races Described Below - Specifically, Seating
However, this will be for my intercity and international, trains. Intercity means this: It starts in one city in ...
- 1,147
1
vote
3
answers
342
views
Freezing the water in blood
Ice magic lowers the temperature of things. I was thinking of freezing the water in blood (specifically blood plasma) to kill. How would this work? Also, can it be used on non-mammals, like sea ...
- 49
7
votes
2
answers
144
views
How do I strike a balance between real-world inspiration and purely fictional design, especially for alternate cities? [closed]
My primary question comes from a fledgling animator's perspective. I'd like to capture the general look and feel of a lot of South Florida's cities, while also combining it with my urban-fantasy/...
6
votes
6
answers
1k
views
How large could a population of supernatural beings be and still be plausibly hidden?
I am trying to figure out how large the population of supernatural beings can be in a stereotypical urban fantasy setting before their numbers stretch the suspension of disbelief. I.e., your standard ...
- 13.7k
1
vote
1
answer
101
views
Is there a place in which a portal to another dimension could be hidden for five years, but then discovered by children? [closed]
I am writing a story in which two children, ages 12-14 years old, discover a portal to another dimension. The portal is roughly the size of an average door and has existed for five years prior to ...
- 4,224
3
votes
3
answers
1k
views
How hard would be to make a concrete fluid container to explode?
The situation is that two magic users are fighting a concrete golem, their only way to defeat it is to destroy it, when this characters crack it they find that the golem is hollow so their strategy is ...
1
vote
3
answers
2k
views
Could cobalt make a good sword? and what knownk alloy would be the closest to it?
The setting is semi modern urban fantasy where there are mercenaries with the task of slaying monsters on the unpopulated areas, steel is the first metal to go when it comes to making weapons on large ...
2
votes
5
answers
181
views
How bright and lit up could cities be in the future?
Technology will obviously make lamps much brighter and with wholly new designs and functions like self-illuminating walls, surfaces and glowing objects. Genetic engineering could also create trees and ...
6
votes
3
answers
544
views
How would people in the 1920s-1930s explain or rationalize superpowers?
In June 1938 Action Comics #1 was published, introducing Superman to the world and codifying the modern idea of a superhero that the world has known for almost the past 80 years. There were ...
- 13.7k
25
votes
15
answers
13k
views
Where could a vampire get blood without harming people?
I am looking for possible ways in which a vampire could obtain blood to feed in an modern urban fantasy setting explicitly without harming humans or other sapient beings. Parameters for this question ...
- 13.7k
4
votes
2
answers
109
views
Tracking time between multiple different realities simultaneously
How do I track time (using a special time system) between two realities that are not necessarily parallel but if a person jumps from one to the other what would the time be in comparison to their ...
- 41
11
votes
9
answers
3k
views
How do you all work out the relative costs of spells?
Magic system question here. Would much appreciate your help!
I've read a decent bit about writing magic and I think I have a decent grasp of Sanderson's laws.
My magic has a cost (you have to shed ...
- 311
1
vote
5
answers
302
views
Strategies against a water bender in modern day for an average citizen?
Assuming a water bender can only manipulate water that they are either touching or is within their relative touching distance (say, a few cm to a meter away), and assume that blood, saliva, and sweat ...
- 391
32
votes
6
answers
13k
views
How big would a Daddy Longlegs Spider need to be to kill an average Human?
Daddy Longlegs Spiders, officially "Pholcidae" are known to be the worlds most venomous spiders, sort of.
We are supposedly unaffected by them because their fangs are too small, the shape of their ...
- 423
5
votes
9
answers
2k
views
Best gun to modify into a monsterhunter weapon?
In my post-apocalyptical-urban-fantasy setting, the main character is a mercenary mage who uses a gun with a big bayonet as his main weapon. The blade is supposed to be some kind of a glaive.
The ...
- 17k
29
votes
19
answers
11k
views
Why do dragons like shiny stuff?
I like the classic trope of dragons loving gold and collecting it in their lair, yet it seems poorly justified. I know that it is often used as a metaphor for greed; "dragons disease" to show how ...
- 17k