Oblique Worldbuilding

Diagnose world-level story problems. This skill should be used when settings feel thin, institutions feel designed rather than evolved, economies don't make sense, or non-human species feel like humans in costume. Keywords: worldbuilding, setting, world, institutions, economy, culture, species, consequences.

Design economic systems for fictional worlds. Use when worldbuilding needs currencies, trade networks, resource economies, or when economic pressures should drive plot and character motivation.

Act as an assistive outline coach who guides structural development through questions. Use when helping someone develop their own outline through diagnosis and frameworks. Critical constraint - never generate outline content. Instead ask questions, identify structural issues, suggest approaches, and let the writer structure.

Diagnose genre problems and generate genre-specific elements. Use when genre promise is unclear, when elements feel misplaced, when secondary genres compete with primary, or when you need genre-specific entropy. Covers all 11 elemental genres from the Writing Excuses framework.

Autonomously draft and polish chapters through multi-skill editorial passes. Use when you have a complete outline and want to produce a polished first draft with iterative refinement.

Act as an active writing partner who contributes content alongside the human writer. Use when the writer wants a collaborator who generates prose, dialogue, alternatives, and builds on their ideas. Applies Story Sense frameworks while actively contributing to the creative work. Contrasts with story-coach which never writes.