I'm making a planet or a big island (I haven't decided yet) and need some help answering a few essential questions about the world.
Here is what I've already decided:
There are four tribes or groups of people:
the "west" are a rather nomadic people living in and around a forest, setting up camps and every so often moving tearing them down to move somewhere else
the "north" live in a cooler, drier evergreen type forest
the "east" live on and around a beach front there resources mainly come from the sea
the "south" have the most access to earth and metals
I have some more social/cultural aspects of these groups if it helps.
The questions I need help answering are mostly about hat resources they could have in their environments and what they could make with them. ie: horses, carriages, clothing?
I would suggest considering the resources available in each of the tribes' environments and how they might use them in their daily lives. For example, the west tribe, being nomadic and living in a forested area, could potentially have access to a variety of plants and animals for food and materials. They could potentially use horses for transportation, and create clothing and shelter using natural materials like hides and furs.
The north tribe, living in a cooler, evergreen forest, could have access to similar resources as the west tribe, but may also have access to a wider variety of trees for building and crafting. They could potentially use sleds or snowshoes for transportation, and create warm clothing using the furs of animals like wolves or bears.
The east tribe, living on the beach, could have access to a variety of seafood and seaweed for food, as well as shells and other materials from the ocean for crafting. They could potentially use boats for transportation, and create clothing and shelter using materials like bamboo or palm leaves.
The south tribe, having access to a variety of earth and metals, could potentially have access to a wide range of resources for crafting and building. They could use carts or wagons for transportation, and create tools and weapons using metals like copper or iron. They probably have the most need for infrastructure, especially as it relates to extracting and moving heavier resources.
Overall, it's important to consider the unique characteristics and resources of each tribe's environment when developing their culture and way of life because that's what makes it most realistic, but also makes it easier to research what resources would be there based on what real-life places actually have, too. I hope this helps even though this thread is a little old, and good luck with your writing!
I liked Mt. G's answer, but I'd like to ask some questions about those tribes a little more @"Tati ".
Why is it that just the Western tribe needs to be nomadic, but the other tribes don't? Are they nomadic not out of necessity but because of culture/religion? If it's out of necessity, then you should probably make the Western woods have a lot of variety of what different plants and animals grow in different sections during different seasons. Being prompted to leave one area when the food has run dry to move to another area that just became more fertile is usually the reason out of necessity why people are nomadic, if I'm remembering correctly.
How cold is it up North? Because if it's too cold not many would want to live there unless the planet/island is so huge that contact between tribes is rare and some people ended up there one day for some reason (maybe the ancestors were banished there long ago by another tribe? Maybe the north used to not be as cold and they slowly adapted?). Although it is true that our planet has many peoples who lived in the cold, it's really not that many in comparison to all other societies, and the ones that tended the thrive live closer to the equator (i.e., the Mayans, the Incas, the Romans, the Egyptians, etc.). Usually people who lived up in the cold were just really good at living there but not as good at the progression of society since a survival was paramount. If it's not that cold then disregard all this lol. I also might be wrong on some stuff here.
For the Eastern tribe, what is the inland right next to the beach like? Does it not provide enough of its own resources and so they have adapted to heavily rely on the ocean and its resources, or do they simply live like the other tribes do on land but just have access to ocean-related resources? If it's the former, maybe you could make that side of the planet/island more broken up into archipelago-like (and maybe lots of tiny peninsulas like Long Island) coastlines that the Eastern tribe populated.
I'd guess that the Southern tribe would be the most advanced having access to stone, metals, and precious materials that they can build sturdy structures with and trade for things they don't have with the other tribes. Is that what you're thinking? Not that it isn't just as likely that they'd be around the same amount of advancement as the others, it was just an idea.
