Before inviting writers into a shared setting, agree on who can change what. This collaborative worldbuilding checklist helps a group prepare a small launch packet, review additions, and resolve contradictions without asking every contributor to memorize the entire world.
Prepare a One-Page Launch Packet
If you still need to decide how power, travel, and institutions work, start with the worldbuilding pillars guide. Use this checklist once those foundations exist and other people need to contribute.
- Setting promise: State what characters do here and the tone you want in two sentences.
- Fixed facts: List three to five rules a new contribution must preserve.
- Open space: Name places, roles, or questions contributors may develop without requesting permission for every detail.
- Boundaries: Agree on content limits and how a writer can pause or leave a scene.
- Ownership: Record who controls each original character and which submitted material others may reference. Ask before reusing another writer's text outside the agreed setting.
Label What Counts as Canon
- Foundation: A shared rule that needs group agreement to change.
- Shared addition: An approved fact available to everyone.
- Local detail: Something true for one region or storyline, with its scope stated.
- Proposal: An idea that other scenes should not rely on yet.
These labels are an agreement among writers. Keep them in your shared notes; they do not depend on an automatic approval feature.
Copy This Contribution Request
- Addition: What are you introducing?
- Connection: Which established fact does it build on?
- Playable opening: What can another character do because it exists?
- People affected: Whose character, location, or current scene might change?
- Review: Who should respond, and where will the decision be recorded?
- Pending status: What may the contributor write while waiting?
Worked Review: A New Ferry Route
A writer proposes an overnight ferry to an island that previously took three days to reach. Their dockside investigation is playable, but the shorter journey would undo another group's isolation plot. The reviewers approve a local ferry between mainland towns and leave the island crossing unchanged. The contributor still gets a new location; the existing scene keeps its stakes.
Record the decision in a short change log: date, accepted fact, scope, affected scenes, and the person who checked it. A rejected version stays a proposal, not a second source of canon.
Resolve Contradictions Before Launch
First ask whether both accounts can coexist as regional knowledge, different historical periods, or a mistaken belief. If they cannot, pause the affected addition and ask the writers involved which version preserves their existing choices. Do not silently rewrite another person's character to make the setting fit.
Final Invitation Check
- Can a newcomer find the launch packet and the person to ask for help?
- Are there three current tensions and at least two open character roles?
- Is there a place to record accepted additions and later revisions?
- Does the first scene work without reading every lore page?
When the packet is ready, create a CharHaven world profile to hold the introduction and lore. Keep your contribution and approval agreements in the reference text so newcomers can see how to join in.
