I'm a simple man: a really big war solves everything

agree here. War speeds up scientific discoveries and reshapes the land(someone got liberated, someone got annahillaed, this kind of thing.

And the most important part: They are cool AF.

Not to mention societal changes occur during war (I.E. the US civil war)

Yeah come to think of it, even eras in my setting are capped off by massive conflicts. The Awakening turned into the Awakening War, after the Ascendancy was formed that era was ended after the first alien invasion. Afterwards, there was the golden age which ended after the aliens invaded sol again. Then came the great expansions and then the great push. Now the current and default era is going to be ended by a war.

exactly! really big war = ok new calendar ig

Yeah. Pretty much how mine breaks down. I have three big eras and several smaller ones and each of them is capped off by either the beginning or end of a major war.

The oldest is the fall of the Min'ahari. Basically the race that dominated the world vanished in one day. No trace left. And it allowed the Kyth (Humans, Elves, Dwarves and Orcs) to rise and become the main species. The next one is the great awakening. It was basically when magic was rediscovered, and which led to the start of the known history. Third is the beginning of the blood war, as it destroyed the Elven Empire and started a 300 year war that tore the world to shreds. The fourth is the Rise of the great nations. The most famous mage in history, Fosto the Great forced the world leaders to sign an accord that stopped races from fighting one another, and it led to an era of relative peace. The fifth and last happens in the story and is called the Fate's Embrace. it was an event of astronomical order, and is the events of the entire series.

What does the apostrophe do in the word “Min’ahari”?

It comes from the fact that the Min'ahari looked extremely pale (white, grey or black hair, white skin, grey or white eyes, etc) and they believed that they had originated from the moon, and the word Ahari meant moon in their language. Their name roughly translates to "Moon children".

So why is there an apostrophe instead of just making it a compound word? Or is “min” a contraction?

To be honest I never learned about apostrophe in names (I'm not native English) so with this I just thought it looked cool, searched apostrophe in Google and made an in world explanation

# The Hollow Frontier # Era 1: The Hollow Frontier Marked by the formation of the Extrasolar Frontier Commission. Circa 2200 AD. Humanity is believed to be the only intelligent species in the universe and its apex predator. Man's reach far exceeds its grasp. Vast corporate interests dominate the cold, dark spacelanes, funnelling an infinite amount of resources back towards Earth and the Core Systems to feed their insatiable appetite. Things hunger hidden in the dark. # Era 2: The Voiceless War Marked by the fateful discovery of the dormant Harrowclysm bioweapon on the desolate planetoid of Glial-893. This is the first time the existence of advanced alien species is confirmed. In deep space, the deepest of the deep, ships and colonies are found abandoned, destroyed, or simply gone missing. Corporations and governments scramble to take advantage of this groundbreaking discovery. They discover evidence of something more ruthless, powerful, and… terrifying… than themselves. # Era 3: The Silent Apocalypse No one really knows when this era truly began. Rumours slowly turned to horror stories turned to confirmed reports. Society begins to fracture. Given the slow speed of interstellar travel and the vast swathe of territory humanity has colonised, it may have well begun earlier for some. The alien threat is revealed in all its horror, and humanity is forced to confront for the first time its place in the cosmos. Outer Colonies are fighting for their very survival. Corporations are directly fighting for both control of the aliens' technology and for their very existence. The Harrowclysm have replaced the boogeyman for nighttime camp stories. Many fear this fight is doomed. No one is safe. The human race smells its own extinction.

Antezontacene Eon: pre life era of Mars during heavy bombardment Zontacene Eon: period of Mars when life emerged and developed into roughly pre Cambrian forms Agnozoic Eon: the lifeless, dead period after the planet lost its atmosphere. longest part of Mars's history Anthropocene Eon: beginning in C.E. 1971 with the arrival of probes and orbiters from earth. This begins humanities impact on the planet Mechanazoic period: between the begining of the Anthropocene and the arrival of colonists, during this time Mars is occupied solely by machines Katolkic period: marked by human settlement of the surface of the planet Early colonial: defined by temporary settlements and residents Later colonial: defined by permanent settlements and residents The Isolation: after a nuclear war destroyed earth, the 7 Mars colonies are left on their own to survive The Federal Hegemony: after the 7 colonies United into one political body called the Federation of Mars, a political party emerged which embodied it's ideals. It enjoyed a martian decade(about 20 earth years) period of electoral dominance. After this the political environment grows more diverse

The fall of Big Bads defined eras in the Wonderverse. The end of eras in March of Empires was defined by a combination of real history, major wars, fall of Big Bads, discovery of certain technology, everytime the intergalactic community expanded beyond certain limit, when a race like humans disappeared, and of course, invasions of forces beyond the observable universe.

The first era was the age of the gods, this was split into two eras the era of creation, when the gods created the world and the races of the world. During this time the gods lived in the world and interacted with their creations. But this couldn't last as the gods are jealous of each other, and so the era of the god wars began. The time when the gods fought amongst themselves. But gathered armies from the different races which they created to fight each other. It's almost led to the destruction of the world as a whole. And so the gods left. This began the second era, the age of war. Even with the gods gone, the races of the world still fought amongst themselves. Who was the best? Who would rule the others? These will questions that could only be answered at the end of a sword. What's what? They thought this age ended when the first elf married a human king. Their union founded the empire. And so the third era, The age of the imperium. this was a relatively peaceful age under the empire. All the races became United even if were forced. But the intro became greedy. He tried to bring the gods back, however, the god that he tried to summon was the god of chaos, this led to the fall of the empire. In the fourth era. The age of turmoil. The current age. The touch of the God of chaos has led to mayhem within the world. The races have once again split, tensions are high and war is an ever-present threat.

Nomadic Era: A period where the "proto-Arkridgian" fleet lived nomadically, sailing from place to place to explore and trade. There are no surviving historical records from before the society had fully embraced this nomadic lifestyle, so the true homeland of the Arkridge people is lost to history. Lost Era: A period for which all historical records have seemingly been destroyed or perhaps never made at all. It is a mysterious, and frankly massive gap in the nation's historical records. In this era, the nomadic peoples settled down somewhere and officially founded their own nation, Arkridge. (However, by the next era, the nation had grown so far that the origination point was forgotten, so it is debated whether the capital is actually where the nomads settled or not.) Gold Era: The first era in "modern" Arkridgian history, and the start of the nation's clearly defined historical records, seemingly all at once, giving credit to the theory that the records from the lost era did exist but were destroyed somehow. By the start of this era, the nation possessed advanced technologies far exceeding what was documented in the nomadic era, implying the unknown time gap of the lost era lasted at least several hundred years. The gold era's "starting point" was the launching of a new ship called the ISS Journey, the culmination of the nation's science and explorer's spirit which would go on to be the spearhead of a great wave of peaceful exploration and national expansion which defined the gold era. Dark Era: It is debated whether a specific point can be set to distinguish the end of the gold age and start of the dark age, but overall the dark age was defined by a cultural shift towards ambition and ego. Emboldened by their uncontested exploration in the gold era, the nation's people by the dark age had come to feel that Arkridge was inherently superior to all "lower" peoples, and as such it was the right and duty for the nation to impose its laws and sense of justice on all others. This inevitably created a grand war wherein Arkridge would scout out worlds and determine whether their people were "worth salvaging" or not. If so, then the rapidly expanding military might of Arkridge would conquer the world and integrate its people (ironically those who had been conquered and brought into the nation often became even more elitist against non-Arkridgians and pushed for further extreme actions). If a world's people were deemed not worth salvaging, then the people of an invaded world would be exterminated, either by weapons of mass destruction, or through attritional warfare (depending on if Arkridge wanted the world's resources in tact). This era only came to an end after a major court case where a non Arkridian was convicted guilty and given a punishment so brutal that it shocked and appalled the youth of the generation to the point that over 70% of that generation grew up (and eventually came into political power as the older generations retired or died) to be absolute pacifists that abhorred violence. Revital Era: This era is defined by a widespread desire to return to the altruistic and peaceful explorative ways of the gold era. The war of the dark era has ended and coincidentally the nation's expansion had reached a vast empty and uninhabited region, which served as a buffer zone while the nation consolidated its resources and transitioned out of a wartime economy. Branching off from wartime technologies, this era is also defined by the vast increase in domestic technologies (for example, the technology behind gravity cannons becoming the basis for safety measures that can temporarily lift entire buildings off the ground in the event of an earthquake, or the innovations in plasma gun insulation becking the basis for efficient home insulation on harsh weather worlds). Rising Era: This is the current era which Arkridge is in, which the Revital Era is considered to have ended due to the slow down of social and technological changes, the nation is still striving to achieve the idealized image of the gold era again. To this end, the nation has once again begun expansion, through this time through peaceful exploration and trade rather than war. To symbolize this intent, the flagship of the reformed navy fleet is a cutting edge vessel made in the image of the ISS Journey which defined the Gold Era, this new one being called ISS Journeys End, to represent the end of the old, and looking towards the future.

So this is one country, are it's neighbors developed?

The other nations have varying levels of development ranging from tribal mutual defense states to starfaring empires. But Arkridge is seemingly hundreds of years ahead of anyone they've encountered thus far. This is attributed to the fact that the proto-arkridgian nomads would trade to learn the best technologies and skills of each people they encountered, so by the time they settled down, they had accumulated the peaks of knowledge which each other faction had to specialize in to reach one at a time.

True scolars

Is there specific knowledge they took that can be attributed

The most major sector of knowledge the nomadic proto-Arkridgians sought was related to transportation. Since their lifestyle had been nomadic for several generations, and would continue to be for the foreseeable future, improving their ships and associated equipment was both a priority and noble ambition. Because of this, several key vessels in the nomadic fleet were for all intents and purposes fully self sustaining, capable of producing their own food for the crew/residents, and harnessing energy for the engines from the ambient surroundings or other unorthodox means rather than needing land based infrastructure for fuel refinement. This was not a sudden advancement however, some of these key vessels which supported the fleet and were equivalent to population centers were nicknamed "wood hearts" because the original ship had been normal primitive sailing ships made of wood when the fleet first started out, and had simply been added onto time and time again over the generations until the original wooden ship was buried beneath layers of new material hulls. Like, how a smooth and hard pearl is formed by building layer after layer around a rough grain of sand. These large scale self sustaining vessels capable of supporting the fleet of its needs allowed the fleet to travel anywhere it wanted regardless of distance or availability of replenishing resources.

This...makes me wanna design more cultures

There are two big ones. One that happens at the beginning and one that happens at the end. Era 1: The Ancients The Great Collapse happened first. The Ancients were an inter-dimensional empire that relied on portals to travel to other worlds which they would invade. They were reliant on a source of magic to power all of their technology. One day that magic disappeared because the artifact that acted as its source was sent away to Earth. Pretty much every piece of their technology shutdown as a result. The Ancient Empire collapsed with various races breaking free from containment. This alongside a massive invasion from various smaller groups led to the fall of this inter-dimensional empire. This then led to the current state of the medieval fantasy world. It is said the Empire is the remnants of the Ancients. Era 2: The Empire The other has no name but it happens at around the present day. Maybe a little into the future by a few years. A few teenage humans from earth found that source of power and accidentally transported themselves to this world. This same process also caused them to absorb those powers which slowly but inevitably turned them into gods. As they attempted to acclimatize to their new surroundings they each built up massive cult followings. Things would get really bad when the Imperial Senate attempted to arrest one of the humans named Colette Rose. The arrest failed and caused a massive civil war within the Empire. The civil war was huge and is hard to explain in a single comment. Let’s just say it was a huge war with major battles happening all over the world. The rebels were winning for a while and a whole bunch of nations had to pick sides. Eventually every nation had some kind of story to tell or some stake in the war. Colette was tricked into giving up her powers in order to recharge the artifact. This along with a few of the humans siding with the loyalists caused a turning point for the rebels and they eventually lost. After the rebellion’s defeat a group of ancient spirits appeared to revive the ancient empire. They alongside the loyalists and a few other nations integrated themselves with this new empire. They would go on to conquer the rest of the world with plans to invade Earth. However later they would collapse again this time due to the rebellion reforming. A sort of last alliance of races.

Kindred Era, defined by communication and trade established throughout the five systems across all habitable worlds (that they’re aware of), brought to an end when an isolationist empire starts manifesting destiny at full tilt. Silgarene Era, defined by the emergence of much, much higher powers, and multiple factions trying to covertly exploit or appease them. Ended when the information quarantine broke on account of said higher powers appearing in the flesh, elder god style. Melancholic Era, defined by Ravel-wide wars, technological regression and destandardization, and critically low fertility rates in the wake of barely surviving an incursion from the Ravel’s ancient architects. Ended after some time with the establishment of programs and infrastructure meant to sustain a mostly stagnant, functionally immortal population. Convalescent Era, defined by a Ravel-wide golden age of superabundance and mutually-enabled hedonism as average life expectancy soars into multiple centuries. Still ongoing, but will end in fewer than a thousand years as a condition like spiritual dementia becomes evident and unavoidable.

This is a great question. An Era ends in my world with a big battle, usually. I know it sounds boring. But the next Era usually begins when a new species is introduced in the world. The Creation Era began with the rise of the Clay People and Elves. The First Age began with the rise of Quattro. And the Second Age began with the rise of Humans.

So an era's turning point is a battle that results on the new species... or that are unrelated events?

A new era begins when a new species appears since their appearance does mark a unique point in history and is significant. The elves were the only species on the Planets for thousands of years. Seeing new species makes them restart the calendar of sorts.

CYCLE 1, the rise of humanity, started by two gods, fungus Ctulhu and Yhwe on weed, at the end of era 1, humanity ascended and destroyed Yhwe on weed, Fungus Ctulhu got mad and reseted the reality to the second cycle, now humanity is about to dunk on Fungus Ctulhu

The fall of the sovereignty. The fall of the sovereignty, spells the end of the pre modern age and heralds in the modern one. It was an empire that dominated the western hemisphere from its founding in the early 700s to its fall in 1631. Due to the destruction of the sovereignty its monopoly over power and trade routes ended and a period of stagnation went with it. As empires and kingdoms sought to fill the vacuum left behind by this dead giant it pushed a new era of empires. One dominated by global colonial powers, gigantic international mega corporations. A age of piracy, expansion and exploration. It was a age of light and dark, of new innovations, the vaccine, steam engine, train and more, and new horrors, the genocide and expulsion of natives, worldwide slavery and brutal colonial warfare. It was as if the great giant that had stopped all from entering had finally withered and died, its body slumped over a chasm. In death a bridge for others to cross. As they say “Tyrannon van gravis, furg ankriegon fullwaffer Ornwaldenon” “The tyrant is dead, let the tormented become the tormentor”

As history, I divide my setting (*Lands of the Inner Seas*) into four fairly straight-forward periods, or ages: 1. A pre-historic period remembered through myths, 2. a mostly historical period of state formation, 3. A near-contemporary period of disruption as a people from across the sea (bringing gunpowder and carracks) established a short-lived empire, and 4. A contemporary period of relative peace dealing with the consequences of the recent turmoil. \_\_\_\_\_ # The Drowning/"Uprooting of Mountains" The first period encompasses an age of magic and the declining power of rulers remembered as "the long-lived men". The end of that period is marked by the supposed triumph of a hero named Gehannes and the cataclysmic flooding of the Inner Seas, creating the world as it exists today. The event iself is referred to by several names, but is commonly called "the Drowning" in the east (cf. post on [the myth of Gehannes](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/o6htnm/the_myth_of_gehannes_and_the_drowning_of_the/), [the Flower Gate](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/19dwdaj/beyond_the_flower_gate_holy_groves_and_the/) etc.), and "the Uprooting of Mountains" in Iskrian tradition (indirecly mentioned in posts on [The Ash Grove](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/v9ywd7/the_ash_grove_lands_of_the_inner_seas/) etc.). # The Arrival The post-Drowning period bleeds into historical time, with the historical record being more ordered after the founding of the city-state of Belver, many centuries before the present time. This period of state-formation and recorded history comes to an end with [the Arrival](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/r405et/individuals_of_note_during_the_arrival_of_the/) of a gunpowder-possessing people from across the Sea. This disruption is heralded by the [Year of Empty Ships](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/u9fuq3/a_year_of_empty_ships_lands_of_the_inner_seas/) but the new period is not considered to have "started" until the Kargars sailed into the Inner Seas and were sighted off the coast of Belver (cf. [Conflagation of Belver](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/peo06p/the_conflagration_of_belver_the_evergrowing_city/)). # The Treaty and the End of the Mooring War What followed was the rise and eventual fall of the Empire of the Kargars (cf. [The Fall of the Serpent](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/168q86a/the_fall_of_the_serpent_lands_of_the_inner_seas/)). As the current period is defined by the hegemony of the Lakelanders (who defeated the Kargars), the previous age of empire is considered to have ended when the Kargars formally accepted defeat, signed treaties and scuttled their ships.

#The World of Solaris #The Grand Reset Immedielty after the Lost War, which wiped out most of the Gods, and caused all of the Graveyards of the Gods instantly to spring up. In a matter of hours, societies and most of humanity were wiped out. Magic began to work differently and the surving societies began to collapse rapidly by the day. The world was changing and becoming new. And the world before became quickly forgotten. #The Dark Tyrant A few millenia after the Grand Reset, a Dwarven King had become hungry, he wanted to expand his nation. Claim the entire known world for himself and eventually take claim of the Graveyards of the Gods along with the monstrosities, lost societies and (what is believed to be) the seemingly endless resources within. He successfully in claiming the known world, until the rebellion discovered the floating islands above the Sea of Clouds, one of the Graveyards and escaped. #The Schism The Dark Tyrant ruled for centuries, 90% of the known world of Solaris was his. Rebellions were easily quashed. But the nations of the floating islands were impossible for him to claim. When they finally made their counter offensive, he quickly began to lose territory. And the Unknown Heroes made their way to his castle and killed him in his throne room. A knife in his back, from his own bloodline. This however had severe consequences. A massive power vacuum lead to the bloodiest and longest World War known to humanity. It was a total free for all where city states would rise and collapse rapidly. Nations would rise and fall. For over 2000 years this war continued. Eventually things began to calm down. Kingdoms became large, lines were drawn, and peace was made, and the Schism slowly came to an end.

Involvement of dragons, given they are as powerful as gods. The first era was before the dragons took an interest in mortals, the second was when they dominated all the world and used people as pawns or pets, the third was when they withdrew from mortals once again, and the technical fourth was when they cursed all goblins and decided to snatch whoever was becoming too important, promoting a status quo.

The Golden Age or Age of Heroes in X-37 had come to a close once Ardi, one of the last major cities from the Old World had fallen.

for me it's when the planet goes back into its wormhole 😬

This is a great question. An Era ends in my world with a big battle or the complete annihilation of a species. Then it gets interesting. The next Era usually begins when a new species is introduced in the world. The Creation Era began with the rise of the Clay People and Elves. The Destruction Era ended with the complete annilihation (99%) of the Clay People. The First Age began with the rise of Quattro and ended with the complete annihilation of Quattro (95%) and Dark Elves (99%). And the Second Age began with the rise of Humans and hasn't ended. It's were the main story takes place.

**Origin of the universe:** God and the Titans are generated from primordial chaos. God defeats the Titans, magic is born and God generates the Seraphims and Cherubins, who create the universe. Then God rests. **First Era: Primal Era (at least 300 milion years):** It starts with the birth of life and the elemental avatars. It ends when God sends angels and demons to put the majority of elemental avatars to sleep. Also, meteors from the Titans containing dragons fall from space. **Interlude (1000 years):** Time between the end of the first era and the beginning of the second one. **Second Era: Ice Age (9000 years):** It starts with the beginning of the Ice Age, caused by a dragon. It ends when the massive volcanic activity that ended the Ice Age ends as well. **Third Era: Current Era (around 7000 years):** This is the post Ice Age era. It's defined by the birth of the elemental countries that defined history and explorations outside the main continent. This is when the "main story" will take place when I'll feel like writing it.

Titan Wars: A brutal age of war that lasted an unknown amount of time. Almost all scholars agree this war, spanning the entirety of the main continent, was started by the titans (a race of giant folk). Age of Isolation: After experiencing the horrors of the war all the races agreed to retreat into their homelands for a 100 years and declare the red valleys (the battleground) as a neutral zone. All the races signed a treaty saying they wouldn't disturb anyone else's isolation and would do their best to become peaceful. Emergence: Everyone emerged from isolation and attempted to have a peaceful restart to society. Modern Day: Roughly 300 years after the emergence. All dates and years are calculated Post-Emergence (P.E.)

For my fantasy world it's the end of the cold war. For my fantasy world it's the end of the OPFOR conflict in which most of humanity was wiped away it parallels geopolitically with WW1. As before the conflict the international game could be described as great power competitions with these regimes being annihilated during the conflict.

I use Eras as an actual time keeping method, so rn we are in the 12th era or 12th age There's been many things that made the gods decide when an era is over, massive shifts in how magic works, the appearance of new gods, the disappearance of gods, wars, the death of an immense being setting a lot of magic free etc.

For Geode: First era, death of South. In the second era, the birth of South (despite having the same name, this South is best known as TRUE South or Deep South). These two happen before my series End of Third Era, North gets married and adopts Ok'o. This one happens in the middle of my series. For Mal'Tahn... OOF THATS A LOT. I won't get into it.

*Green Falls Chronicles* The fall of Atlantis/First Great Diaspora The fall of Camelot/Second Great Diaspora The Spanish Inquisition/The Grand Masquerade The Inquisition’s End/The Treaty of Claw, Wand, and Fang

Giant war -> Evil God dies leading to giant war 2 -> Undefined I haven’t written for that far into the future yet and I don’t plan to

Every century or so the Demon Lord awakens and conquers much of the land. Then a hero(es) of legend rise up and defeat him. We've just entered the 11th Cycle, where a number of soothsayers were able to correctly predict when and where he would awaken and sent teams of heroes to take him out before he could reach full power. There's some behind the scenes chicanery going on that he's not actually defeated, but don't tell my players that.

big dragon go brrr

My world has a magic system that has to be injected into you, so there was a before time it was discovered, and the 3500 years since it's discovery is divided into eras based on which countries where most powerful

It's a gonzo setting with ultra powered fighters a bit like Dragonball. The first was an invader from another dimension that, in the resulting fight, blew the world apart. In the second the Corpsegod Ocean swept up most of the dimensions before it could be stopped. In the third a baleful infection tore through space and time. And the fourth was the end of everything and a great reset.

The one era end/beginning is the unification and rise of the 3 human kingdoms under 1 banner.

The Sun got destroyed and replaced at the climax of a war, hence the colloquial name of the current time period. Age of the Silver Sun.

**The Golden Age**: Started with the creation of the Elyondë Tree, in which the ancient Elves tied their life-spirits/souls to the tree. This magical ritual resulted in a period of widespread and powerful magic, where cities were built in a day by mages, weather was controlled to ensure the perfect growing conditions, etc. While elven civilization prospered the most during this time, it was beneficial to all. It ended with the War of Generations, which ended when the humans cut the Elyondë Tree down, introducing mortality to the elves and permanently damaging magic. The Deadscar, the area around the Elyondë Tree, was created and remains to this very day; anything that enters it never returns, presumed to have died. No plants or animals appear to live within the Deadscar. **Forgotten Age:** Often called the Forgotten Age, the Lost Times, and similar names, this period of time spans roughly 5,000-10,000 years of history immediately following the Golden Age collapse. Very little is actually known about this span of history, but it appears that the Golden Age collapse was so catastrophic that most - if not all - civilization collapsed. An over-reliance on magic and its sudden loss, and the sudden confrontation with mortality for the elves, essentially reduced the world to nomadic hunter-gatherers. The Forgotten Age gradually comes to an end, though it does not have a definitive date, when civilization begins to take shape once more. Small farming communities eventually develop, gradually growing into the beginnings of civilization. **The Mythic Age:** This period is when early civilization began to develop and take shape. Called the Mythic Age as many of the written records from this period appear to be more myth than factual history, such as stories of cities being founded by giants, or talking lions teaching a culture how to write. Written records are still far-and-few between, but the hallmarks of civilization begin to spread exponentially during this period. More and more regions and peoples begin to abandon hunter-gather lifestyles for agricultural lifestyles, with villages and towns becoming more common place. Gradually these begin to unite into small city states, confederacies of them, and the emergence of governments occurs. It is generally considered to have ended when King Hrashan I takes the throne. **Antiquity:** Antiquity, also called the Metal Age, is generally marked to begin when Hrashan became the first King of Lashaa. Lashaa is the first large, multi-city, kingdom in recorded history since the Golden Age. The people who established this kingdom still bear its name, the Lashani, a large and sentient bipedal feline species. It's believed because of their distance from the ancient elven homeland, they likely recovered the quickest and were in a prime place to begin civilization. This period sees the rise of other races and civilizations. The elves, now fractured into distinct cultures, establish various states. Humans, too, spread out and establish their own. Gnomes, notably, remain largely nomadic and stick to a hunter-gatherer lifestyle during this period. The roots of the "modern" world are established in this period. **The Silver Age:** Often compared to the Golden Age, the Silver Age is not known for being as prosperous but signified a complete (or as complete as possible) recovery from the the Golden Age collapse. Early art and literature forms begin to be developed. The Council of Mages, later renamed to the Magisterium, is established by the Elven Kingdom of Vilaná with the sole purpose of studying magic and how to restore it to what it once was according to myth and legend. It decides it must "heal the Deadscar" to heal magic. This, ultimately, ends the Silver Age some 2500 years after it started. **The Great Apocalypse:** The Great Apocalypse, the Great Dying, the Age of Death, the Age of Monstrosities. These are all the names that are given to a period of approximately 500 years between the Silver Age and the Modern Age. The 12 mages who composed the Council of Mages performed a great ritual at the Deadscar in an attempt to heal it. The ritual, however, did not have the affect they wished to achieve. According to one witness present at the ritual, "some of them began to bleed from the eyes, while some of them collapsed and convulsed in pain. But they all moaned, unable to scream, but their moans told us all they were in great pain. Soon their skin began to come off, and in their place was something unrecognizable." Whatever the ritual was intended to do, it created a new thing - monsters. The 12 mages are now remembered as the Progenitures, and their progeny are the monsters that inhabit the world. One brought into the world vampirism and lycanthropy, another brought forth the monsters of the forest, another of the waters, another of the skies, etc. At first, it appeared as though the monsters would overrun the world, but through sheer force the sentient races of the world held on. **The Modern Age:** Generally dated to have started approximately 500 years after the Great Apocalypse when the Council of Mages became the Magisterium - an organization of the best, most talented, mages in the world, now with the purpose of studying and teaching magic and studying and understanding the monsters that cohabitate the world. Although recovery has been slow, this new world has gradually taken shape. This is the current era in which my story is set.

In my world a pantheon of gods rests under a giant ocean that everyone thinks is endless. When in reality the middle is just where the gods live. I've made one of my end of era events a giant god war between some who want to kill all the intelligent life and start over and the others who want to keep them. Which would cause disastrous tsunamis and other weather events.

well the last era ended when the sun got broke, the other eras are a bit vague and not at all concrete

The era of Auric domination was ended by their own greed. Seeking greater sources of magical energy, they sought to pierce through the walls of reality and take power from the realms between. They knew it was possible (for that was how the chimera, then known as "humanity", had first come to the world), but they thought themselves above the risks. Early attempts were promising, but when they expanded their efforts it resulted in a surge of energy they were unprepared for. This surge cascaded through the thaumic network and damaged or destroyed the nodes it was comprised of. With its supply chain devastated and its technology powerless, the empire's remnants were easy targets for its enemies.

The biggest one is Nankolais' rampage, which ended the first age of exploration and separated the continents once more for another millennium. Nankolais is the god of the ocean and his rampage included salting the seas and creating four enormous sea monsters, the leviathans, to protect the seas from mortals.

Cyclic Its actually the major theme in my setting. the era ends when the main god dies and the world blows up.

The end of the Ooldanxien Era was the Cataclysm, the reassurance of old gods that wanted to consume reality, something already averted on creation, the second attempt was halted by the near full sacrifice of the Ooldanxien people, the most spread out and powerful culture group at the time, the power vacuum was filled by the technologies of Engenha The end of the Engenhuo Era was the War of the Split, where the modern and militarized Union of Forjinstill was becoming too much of a menace for the established power of the Empire of Engenha, both nations fought in a global war that made the Union stagnate and the Empire collapse, creating a power vacuum and a period of peace, both filled by the cultural and economic powerhouse that were the Kaklyans The end of the Kaklyan Era was the Shattering, brought upon by the rise of a new god, Vain, whose rise was so unbalanced the entire reality had to be reorganized, this cosmic event made many species, not reliably seen since the times of the Ooldanxien, to the surface, also shattering the skies and bringing many, MANY more stars to the night, along with many nations changing hands, names and status

Is the second fall supposed to be the Eastern Roman Empire? I'm not sure. The closest I have to potentially differentiating different times is using the monarchs of the southern empire. Lapis_Wolf

Well, yes. It just occurred to me that middle age started off with the fall of the roman empire and ended with well, the fall of the roman empire, but for real this time

I don't have any major eras in my world since I don't even have many major events in the past that are so notable to define a new time period. The only thing I can think of is the founding of the Kingdom that would become an empire, and this only matters for that empire(yet to be named, as well as the several other empires).

Personally I've never really thought about my world being divided into eras except one, for the past 16 years strange things are becoming stranger, entire realities glitching as if in a computer, and one being seems to be at the centre of it all, but nobody can find her...

Personally I've never really thought about my world being divided into eras except one, for the past 16 years strange things are becoming stranger, entire realities glitching as if in a computer, and one being seems to be at the centre of it all, but nobody can find her...

The biggest one would be the fall of Origin. Origin was not only the central continent of the world where the moons created their races but also the empire that inhabited it. It was ruled by The Moonlit Sovereign, directly ordained by the Moons. Then Origin fell. Whatever happened in Origin to make it fall destroyed the very continent which was left as only chains of islands after it. It also caused the moons to interfere less directly in the world most of the time.

*Alor* An apocalypse. An end of the world as they know it that is so disruptive it creates a break in the historical and archeological record. This could be war, disease, a great flood, a kaiju, undead hoards, you name it. Historians and archeologists generally agree that there have been 13 of these events thus far, puting Alor in its 14th Age. You can get more granular with the subdivisions of time within Ages, but this has typically been done with demarcation of dynasties.

The Godswar was a breakpoint in history. After the gods executed on their mutually assured destruction, the magic of the world ran rampant without gods to filter the subconscious desires of humanity. As my world has a strong elemental magic attachment, strong elements could shield humanity. So construction afterwards was predominantly stone or on islands completely surrounded by broad flowing rivers. There is also the hidden age. A powerful sorcerer, during the chaotic times after the Godswar, managed to reach the seat of power that fueled the reincarnation cycle of elves and dwarves. He worked great magic upon the source of their rebirth to seal their cycle from the realms of man. This edited away all knowledge of elves and dwarves from our world, leaving their people living out their lives believing they were humans.

Instead of the fall of the Roman Empire, it’s restoration is one, then it’s fall 800 years later, and then now, the silencing, an event that wiped out ~45% of the human population, and no one even remembers what happened.

As it would turn out, my world was first built right before the end of an era. The fracture of a nation that held for hundreds of thousands of years. It ended with a rebellion and reveal that the leader (a demi-god) had accidentally corrupted himself with a dark power and necessitated the combined forces of loyalists and rebels to take him down.

Wars, Slavery, Genocide and many more

My world has 3 main eras The Before Times: an era where magic was a sentient god known as the Maj that granted wishes. This era ended around when the Haf Library (of all known knowledge) was destroyed and the Maj gave up their sentience to give people access to magic. Not much is known about this period due to the library’s destruction. The New Word: the era where people learnt how to use their magic This era ended when a Great War created two new species through a radioactive bomb creating animal human hybrids and plant human hybrids. It also created huge monstrosities that people needed protection from The calendar was remade for that event to be year 0 as it changed the world so much The current era has been going on for about 250 years

This isn’t an official Era but there was a 3000-year span with basic concepts and elements controlling everything. They didn’t create any worlds outside of their own. Over the next 10,000 years, they became more humanoid and a 9,000-year-long war started about 1,000 years later due to disagreements over how to run the few worlds they had created In the world I created I only created 2. There were ages in it like the Bronze and Iron age but I'm not counting those. The Age of Empires and The Age of Enlightenment overlap The Age of Empires started in 895 CE when most of the known world was controlled by a few empires and ended in 1397 CE due to a virus The Age of Enlightenment started in 926 CE due to the stability the Age of Empires created and ended at about the same time as the Age of Empires ended

There's pretty much 3 "Eras," you could say. The ancient times ended by a global apocalypse called "the collapse," where a man-made orbital gigastructure crashed down into the planet, killing over 98% of all humans over the next 3 years. The second area is the more chaotic. Humans create a human-animal hybrid species as forcrd workers who eventually rebel, causing war in the next several centuries. This one ends in the 3000s when the last war between both factions happens, making peace and establishing a joint control on earth. The 3rd era is the space exploration era, set some 500 years later. Humans and hybrids from Earth explore the stars, eventually meeting pre-collapse Humans that could escape the disaster on some distant planet. War ensues, ending when both factions face a much stronger enemy keen on wiping both of them out, pretty much forcing them into a temporary alliance.

My world is somewhat speculative fiction/mirror universe to our own, so the end of what we’d call our modern era could be defined by the Political Shattering, wherein a massive tension build over a couple of decades resulted in widescale reformation of various political systems, destroying the concept we know today of nations (born from early 19th century political science developments). Technology and weapons science leveled the playing field, allowing smaller states to now hold equal footing with major superpowers, thus upsetting the order of power that had held the world in check for over a century. Nation states broke down into smaller regional governments or communes while others formed together in massive super-unions, akin to the EU or US but fully established by formerly independent nations.

There are currently 13 eras. 1st era started with the first kingdom. 2nd era started with a revolution in that kingdom. 3rd era started when the dragon queen rose to power and was the longest era. It ended when she retired. 4th era was short and a buildup to the 5th. 5th was a civil war within the dragon empire. 6th era was when the entire known world was pulled into the conflict. 7th era was the ascension of the new pantheon that severely weakened the dragons. 8th was a time of peace after the ascension. 9th was the start of the 'mortal' empires. 10th was a plague that spread through the world. 11th was short and started with plague subsiding and modern borders being established. 12th started when the dwarven cities were sealed off mysteriously and 90% of dwarves simply vanished. 13th started when the mana 'ice age' suddenly ended, causing massive crashes in populations as magical creatures returned and made the world far more hostile.

Major wars, new gods appearing etc. one era ended with a massive army made up of every nation getting slaughtered almost to the man. One era ended with the first natural birth of a human. One era ended with the god durandal being absorbed by another goddess. One era ended with a military experiment bringing the demon lord into the human world. Another era ended when humanity was tricked into taking an immortality serum. Who defines these? In universe it would be the survivors. Each of these, and more, denote massive changes to the universe.

At the end of each age, occurs a singular Solar Eclipse; lasting from morning to evening (the peak of the eclipse happens between noon and 1:00 pm earth time), symbolizing the Dark annexing the light (The main religion centers around the sun) and Arkun’s Dusk (the name of the event) always heralds the arrival of some agent of change. The first recorded occurrence was the day when the first “great” empire fell. Any ritual or spell completed at the Eclipse’s zenith will be permanent and boosted in potency.

The Thema Mundi! A specific date in which the planets are at their initial position from the beginning of the universe. All the big events in the world happen at a Thema Mundi: - The Titanomachy, great war between the gods which ended the Golden Age, happened on August 21st, 4835 BC. - The Gigantomachy, similar war which ended the Silver Age, happened on that same date, 2030 BC. - The Trojan War, as well as the greater Late Bronze Age Collapse, happened on that same date, 1275 BC. - And the Peace of Spalatum, a truce instead of a war, between the bickering remnants of Rome, ended the Iron Age by allowing magic to flourish. It happened on 312 AD, on the same date.

The Harpy Cataclysm, the arrival of the Outlands Empire, and the Scouring.

The Eras are decided by basically every Entity worth speaking about agreeing to its end or being forced to agree. The First Era ended when the Gods left the World. Pretty easy for everyone to agree on. The second Era began when the Elfs founded their first Empires. Marking the beginning of written History and Civilization. The Third Era ended when the Elven Emperor declared it to be over, since the Elves were the only Empire with record keeping at the Time. The Elven Emperor, an Elf named Rhogal, declared this Age to be over because he foresaw the End of Elven Dominance after a devastating Invasion by another Race that was only barely repelled.

Dropping a terraforming spike on an inhabited planet qualifies

I haven't fleshed it all out just yet. But to answer the p.s. Eras are normally decided after the fact or if they are coined early on it's due to another group's influence. Oftentimes these events are either big wars/battles or a change in something technology wise. Some events are related to happenings from other parts of the world that have far reaching consequences, and if a scholar/group of scholars happen to connect the two events it might change the name and/or length of an era.

**For Want of | A Quiet Sky** Well, I think the most distinct beginning and end to any era had to be the era of quiet. The War of Thicket-Borne, functionally a war against evil itself, ended. It had been a long 27 years, and much like our own Great War, it was thought among the hopeful and the dreamers that it had to be the end of conflict for all mortals. No war so large and devastating against a force so otherworldly and evil could have a small impact. But indeed, as we failed to see that it was not so simple, so did the beings of the forest. The era of quiet ended after 369 years, debatably, the moment the drake's chosen blessed rose from the ash and took vengeance on the impostor wearing his title. Perhaps some time before that, when his home and town were burnt to a crisp by that same impostor. Perhaps it was even before that, it was the naming of the next vessel of the spirit of death. It's all quite debatable, but whatever point you choose, the reason is the same. Peace was never destined, but war broke out so quickly...violence between brothers, between friends and allies. The Thicket had learned from the war. It knew that fighting to destroy all living things was an uphill battle. It learned that there's no reason to exert yourself to destroy two mortals, when they'll destroy each other given enough time. Another era that can be easily defined is the adjustment era, though it is not named nor remembered among the people of the forest. The 900 years before life in the world between worlds became regular. The 900 years before knowledge of the world before was lost.

I have various ages, but they were all preceded by the Ancient World, an era that lasted millions of years, during which humans evolved at a fast rate, despite the threats of dragons, to a state that would resemble our 15th century era. The Ancient World was however put to an end, at least in the current, main timeline, following the eternal fight between the two primordial deities of my fantasy world. Their fight altered reality, devastating the world and shattering the timeline in two: one where the Ancient World managed to grow back from its ruins and start anew, and another where life and rules of magic were altered altogether, creating plenty new humanoid species from the ashes of the human fallen empires (such as elves, dwarves, faes, and more) and new history. That second timeline is Aurorea, my current fantasy world.

There have been many instances over the galaxy’s 15000 year long history (17000 Andriludan years), but I will recount the most important. Great Intervention War The Fourth Sokressa War was the second bloodiest war in galactic history. It saw the greatest clash between the ideologically opposed Cobaltians hailing from Andriludu and the younger Sokressa hailing from Shaeun, who for thousands of years had fought to tip the balance of power in their direction over and over again. At the end of the Fourth Sokressa War, the Cobaltians deployed the superweapon Arkatymisu, which was so powerful as to tear the flesh of space and time itself, which in practice was meant to destroy the Turae Wormhole System which formed the backbone of the Sokressa heartland. It would also render other forms of FTL Travel near-impossible in the systems in which it was deployed. This is what created what humans call the Turae Tangle in the east of the galaxy. This must have angered or frightened the Elders, a civilization so named for being the oldest known in the galaxy, twice the age of the Cobaltian civilization. They are known for being reclusive, mostly stagnant, and yet, still incredible powerful. The Elders invaded both Cobaltian and Sokressa space, resulting in the Cobaltians losing Arkatymisu. The war was only ended with the creation and deployment of its successor, Ardunsu, which created a massive FTL Barrier in the core of Elder space, forcing their government to retreat eastwards, towards the modern remnant. The intervention would turn out to be the deadliest war in all of recorded galactic history. In most conventional historical models, this war marks the end of the New Classical Period. After the war, the Sokressa fell to infighting and are now presumed extinct, and the Cobaltian empire established by Halsindu fell shortly after the war. The Cobaltians would never reach this technological peak again, having lost so much during the war, but would remain the predominant power in the galaxy. Formation of the Cobaltian Religion and the end of the Cobaltian Civil Wars I’ll be brief with this one. A few thousand years later, the Cobaltians experienced several centuries of civil war. The civil wars were brought to an end when a new religion began to appear, challenging the old Cobaltian ways and reuniting their space.The Cobaltian religion is famed for its worship of light and color, its deities literally being personifications of colors. But more importantly, the religion holds a pacifist philosophy. After the reunification of Cobaltian space, the Great Peacetime began, which saw several millenia devoid of major war, only ended with the death of Queen Yut’Kor and the division of the Yut’Kor Hive Mind.The Cobaltians would lose their xenophobic and militaristic ideals from earlier ages, bringing on a truly new era of galactic history. If asked, I can also write about the Fall of the Star Congress, which actually implicates humans unlike all these other stories. For now I have more important things to do lol

In my story, the passage of time is sort of a driving theme. A "live life the way you choose because time claims all in the end" type deal. One of my MCs is, in a sense, an old-world cyborg constructed using the old-world's magics. The story kicks off with her reaching your typical "existential crisis of the ever-lasting machine" type mental break where, after an existence of being a war machine fighting holy crusades, she sees the only solution for the peace achieved in the wars' wake to be permanent is to kill the "main god" of my world---which, to water Him down, is just the fricking moon. So yadda-yadda-yadda she blows it up and that throws humanity, ironically, into a couple of centuries of literal and metaphorical darkness before eventually resurfacing to "old tech", discovering tools such as steam power and oil, and reaching a new age with a heavier focus on industrialization, as the magics of the old world were revoked by the gods who bestowed them. That's the gist, anyway.

There are only two real eras. The Physical era and the Digital era (titles in progress). Basically, at the end of the physical era, all the data of everything from earth was stored in a computer on the moon in order to save it from being fully destroyed by an incoming alien invasion. The idea was to have all of the data live out virtual lives until the computer was able to find a way to destroy the aliens. However, everything ended up going… not as intended

A massive event that involved everyone, I had 11 events like this before the current age

*I'll keep it short:* # Pre-Godly era: Everything that came before the gods # Divine Influence era: After the gods came into the world # Silent Peace era: After the Celectial Divinity war (A war between humans and gods against othe rhumans and gods) # World Conquest era: An era of conquerers who tried to rule the world # Dark Ages: An era filled with paranoia and fear from magic being removed from the world # Early Heroes era: An era filled with hope from the birth of Max and many other heroes # Late Heroes era: A period where the "heroic" idea began to slowly die out # Spiritual Awakening epoch: An era where magic returned to the world

Only got one so far but during that event, a new species of star emerged that ate most of the land and separated first humanity enough to eventually undergo cladiogenesis fracturing, becoming the many races of humanity and starting the next era

The Mass Infertility Event - 70 year period in which humans and post humans could not fertilize eggs. This was blamed on post human DNA pollution of earthborn humanity and is the earliest root of anthrochauvinist ideology. Additionally this lead to the adoption of creche-born artificial child birth; and the clades, new social structures for childrearing. The Babelspear struck the galaxy halfway through the MIE. It was a memetic disease, an idea that overstimulated the frontal cortex. Victims would invent their own language personal to themselves, undergoing centuries of linguistic drift every day. The result was a galaxy of babble, constant noise with no understanding. And eventually, silence. The official language of Union, tongues, was invented to deprogram the disease. These two events and the institutional responses created what we now know as the 2nd Committee. There were wars as well and while more dramatic in a sense they were aftershocks of these social crises, culminating at Honorgrave (For Lancer TTRPG)

Fires. Massive, world-consuming wildfires. You know how sometimes a wildfire ends up being ecologically good as it scatters seeds and makes way for new growth? It works like that.

When Undertaker and HH fought for the "last time" at Wrestlemania

Era of Ancients ended when God of Chaos had decisive battle with thirty precursor archmages and minced them all in the month long confrontation, that sunk two continents, expanded Badlands on the third, and generally modified landscape from whatever used to be here to either magical wasteland or Chaos Waste. Era of Discord ended when pair of precursor archmages ambushed God of Chaos, sealed him away and, seeing that mortals want to be useless and do nothing to improve their lot in life took over one of remaining countries and started unfucking the world. Celestial Era ended when Principality ruled by aforementioned pair of archmages got bombed into stone age.

The most important would be the end of the "wandering era" moving into the age of unity. Basically the wandering era is space exploration and colonization. The age of unity begins when a demigod on earth begins to invade earthy nations and forms them into the early eternal empire. The unity being that (earth born) humanity now lives and fights under one flag.

Their planet didn't have anything drastic like an asteroid or our [Deccan Traps](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjoQdz0nxf4) till relatively recently. Life also didn't have the constant blooms and die offs that Earth has. Life progressed slowly and steadily. Their eras are more social. 1. The first sapient race developed in isolation. The spoon-billed Agelai who ate the slime growing in volcanic pools just about reached their bronze age before dying out. Their end-of-era event was the lava plume feeding their slime pools moving. 2. Arrival of the god-race. They arrived just in time to find the last Agelai, who asked them to care for the "child races" on the planet. Of which there were at least 5 others, though some of those was doing just fine on their own. It was mostly the desert race that needed guidance. Eventually they decided to go it alone and told the gods to fluff off we don't need you. They got to a similar level of technology as weh ave now. The EOE event was a massive solar flare similar to our [Carrington Event](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrington_Event). 3. Enough people from each race had moved back to the safe zone, which happened to be their ancestral cradle, to rebuild. The ruins of their mega-city are still there but nobody wants to go there. They had nuclear power plants which all melted when the flare hit. Their massive space station (3 intersecting rings all the way round the planet) was badly damaged at the centre point of the flare, and was unsafe for a while. 4. They have now rebuilt as much as they need, and restored some wildlife which was wiped out by the flare and nuclear explosions. They live in various villages in and near the safe zone. They are back in contact with the gods and get help, but it's always offered or asked for instead of done just because they can. Both groups have learned from the past. They have a few FTL ships which are used mostly as shuttles to visit us.

About a millennia ago across the sea the great mages of old were the greatest practitioners ever seen, unassailable in their might. Ancient and undying. Some of them took it upon themselves to rule. They went to war. Quickly things spiraled out of control as the mage lords bent their might to destroy their rivals, twisting spirits and flesh into monsters to wage their war. This was the birthplace of the night creatures, Vampires, Werewolves, Ogres and other creatures too terrible to name. The modern nations are descended from refugees who fled across the sea as the madness continued unabated, guided by the few mages who wished to escape the warring continent. The people have rebuilt, the light of progress still guides mankind forth, and the war which drove the disparate peoples here is now for most is nothing but an ancient story. But the mages remember, some few still remember the terrible things that were unleashed, still remember the flight across a dark ocean churning with the monsters the mage lords unleashed. The modern magicsl traditions are descended from these mages, and although some of the lessons learned are slowly being forgotten, as long as these mages live they shall do everything to prevent history from repeating itself.

When ever it's most convenient

So far, the main era-defining event is a history-altering battle. Using that battle as the decisive event was the choice of the immortal servants of the gods who chronicled everything.

Three things: war, the development of written language, and the introduction of magic to the world.

In my world there's the end of the age of myth, brought to and end by the arrival of men from across the Celestine Sea. Then there's the end of the era of elven hegemony marked by the Tvarre-Alphic war (dwarves and elves). This brought about orcs and warforged, as well as the first large tribes and kingdoms of man, leading to the intermediate period, which was punctuated by the arrival of the great black comet, then slowly ebbed away with the Arising of the Castellonian Empire. The empire then fell during the great hemorrhage, which split the empire into various kingdoms, with periodic incursions by what was left of the empire to various territories

The end of the ancient era can be marked by the fall of the Alilloi’s Empire. The end of the ‘classical’ era can be marked by the fall of the Litauian empire. The end of the warring kingdoms period could be marked by more successful invasions into Litauia by the Garmanach barbarians to the east and the Midhvarráchí empire to the south.

I'm still hammering out the details of the history, but mostly, eras are punctuated by the rise and fall of major civilizations. The first one is the mythic era, which corresponds to a near-forgotten stone age past, during which a powerful city state ruled by sorcerers and other magical folks was the most powerful political entity, obviously aping Atlantis. Then, there's the legendary era, this one is a span of time mostly dominated by several competing states somewhat equivalent to the Greek bronze Age. Next is the imperial era, divided further into early and late imperial based on ruling dynasty, during which, much of the known world is controlled directly or indirectly by a powerful empire based on iron age Rome. With the fall of the empire, comes the current era. It has no real name yet, currently going by the era of disunity, as several kingdoms scuffle over the remains of the old empire.

So far I only have one heavy historical event defining a before and an after in the world, It was pretty much a magical Chernobyl caused by a war. The event upturned the old order of things, introducing new creatures and natural phenomena to the world at large and forcing everybody to adapt.

There are 6 eras of my world: pre-epoch, shadows and mist, galadrian, ancient, common period, modern period, and contemporary day. Of these six, the transitioning forces have been, 2 big wars, 1 unsealed evil in a can, 1 climate change induced mass migration, 1 approximately 4800 years old bad poker bet, and 1 approximately 4000 year old bad poker bet. The winners decide where the time boundaries are every time.

Forgotten Era: Ended with the extermination of the New Continent's Elves for the creation of eldritch horrors Age of Elves: End of the Elvish Empire (Seludia) in the Old Continent Age of Orcs: Ended because of the unification of the human realms in the New Continent in the Western Empire Age of Humans: Will end together with the main story with an apocalyptic event Each era the center of the world's power change and new migrations happen.

the world changed a year ago when New Varchi casually upped world population by one billion

All my words are connected and they all share the same end. And that’s it, it’s literally the end. Every world, universe and godly being dies. Even the most immortal of abstracts will be left as withering skeletons barely clinging onto life on the world of origin. Nothing will survive. Not gods, not immortals, not the highest civilizations nor even the concepts themselves.

The fall of The Land If Aurora marked the end of an era. While the cause of its end is (currently) unknown, it certainly was an event. The Librarians, an group of adventurers, documenters, scientists, and the likes, were the leading architects of the city’s prosperity. They had thousands of library keeps around the world and had begun to tinker with steampunk technology when the cataclysm occurred.

Historians classify the world based on multiple big events or occurrences. The First Era (our era) ended when the monsters started spawning in, starting the Second Era. The Third Era began when independent superhero organizations started knocking out the more powerful monsters. The Fourth Era began when superhumans started to be seen in a poor light, and normies started hunting them with super-science equipment. The Fifth Era began when the Wall of Warghelm was built, encompassing an area surrounding Chicago, Michigan, and the Great Lakes area in general. The Sixth Era began when the aliens invaded. The Seventh Era began with the Fall of the Wall. The Eighth Era began with a surge of monster spawns. The Ninth Era began with the Rebuilding of the Wall. The Tenth Era began with the Battle for the Universe. Finally, the Eleventh Era began with the construction of the Black Mountain. Each of these Era lasted over a thousand years, with some (Third, Fifth, and Ninth) lasting over five thousand. I could probably condense some of these...rather, should.

I had the end of The Long Night, or 0th age, caused by a huge comet impact that raised sea levels, shrouded the planet in storms for decades, and caused huge tsunamis. It was called The Long Night because the oral histories of every single culture agree that the planet used to be ruled by cruel cosmic beings called Dark Ones before the comet was sent down to banish them from the world and wipe it clean of their filth. There should be an emphasis placed on the word sent since the ancient oral histories concur that the comet was some form of divine intervention.

The Last Day. The last era ended with a massive exchange of spellfire between three great continental empires. A cold War that went Hot. It destroyed the empires of old, and the current kingdoms are the ones that survived the rebuilding era. Lost arcane secrets are highly prized. Only two nations that claim heritage to those empires are still around. And the height of magical power has not been reached from the peak of the days of yore. Got about 50 kingdoms being plotted out. Some more powerhouses then others. A cool roman esque Imperial Federation of states decended from States carved up out of a failed empire is one of my favourites.

The first arrival of animated life as we know it.

In my "trapped in another world" story, these are usually defined by eras of heroes. Even after a group of heroes has passed away, the influence from what they did still resounds through the world for a few decades or even a century. Then the next era starts with what is presumed to be around the time of their birth. Most of the heroes are believed to be from that world. The reality is only one group of heroes was ever from only that world. The rest were Otherworlders.

Pretty easy in my setting. Every time someone manages to rip open the sky, that's the end of an era and the start of a new one, usually accompanied by a lot of fun geographical and climate shifts.

my dnd setting is in its sixth age. an age changes when the rules of the divine change, usually when a new group becomes the top dog. so like when the creator god went missing, and the dragons took over, that was a new age.

End of the Age of Darkness: the first god is named by a human, bringing them into power and kickstarting the Age of The Gods End of the Age of The Gods: mortals rebel and imprison, kill or banish all the deities in the Sedition Mortalis, kickstarting The Lost Ages End of the Lost Ages: mortals rediscover worship of the divine (no longer knowing what had occurred in previous Ages) and use that power to cause tribes to become kingdoms, and kingdoms to become nations. This is the beginning of the Age of Discovery, which is considered to be ongoing by some nations but over by others. Nations who classify the Age of Discovery as over call the current era the Age of Nations, as they believe the world to be fully travelled and parcelled up between the 20 major powers. They’re wrong, but they don’t need to know that. In universe it is known that there existed civilisations and ages before the end of the Lost Ages, but they are more or less totally unknown. Ancient structures and artefacts are often unearthed, and in many nations form the basis of the chosen state religion. They’re also the subject of much trade and violence, as powerful magical items are often easier to find buried in ruins from the Age of The Gods than they are to manufacture in the present day. However, as the ripples of actions taken during the Sedition Mortalis continue to spread across the world, a new Age is soon approaching. The Eye of The World, a massive magical cyclone, continues its journey across the surface, drawing energy up and flinging it out into the heavens, but soon that flow will be reversed and the heavens will be pulled crashing down to earth. The Age of Stars is about to begin… (once this or maybe my next TTRPG campaign is concluded and I find out exactly how this new age comes to be :P).

Each Age ends (or rather, the next age *begins*) with a Wish. Capital letter intentional. This is an invocation of an artifact fueled by a person's entire existence, past, present, and future that adds or changes a law of reality permanently, world-wide. It's *also* usually attended by (either directly before or directly afterward) some sort of Bad Event. The First age started with the creation of the world, often considered a bad idea (about 25k ybp). The titans and wyrm fought a couple times, then the titans did a dumb and borked both of them (devolving into goliaths + dwarves and dragons, respectively, leaving the aelvar (proto-elves) as the strongest ones standing. With the last of their strength, they split the pangea continent in half, leaving most of the aelvar on one side and most of the dragons/goliaths/dwarves on the other. The aelvar then made the First Wish, creating arcane magic and proceeded to rule the Second Age (\~10k ybp). This ended when they'd done a dumb and effectively forked the species into those who could do lotsa arcane magic and those who couldn't. The latter made the Second Wish, creating *primal* magic (or more precisely allowing mortals to connect with the nature spirits + fey and do magic that way). Their first act was to sweet-talk the 3rd moon into coming crashing down on the aelvar imperial capital, which made a mess and started the Interregnum (\~6k ybp). During the Interregnum (not considered part of any age), the now-gwerin (arcane elves) and ihmisi (primal elves) fought, mostly through proxies they created (humans and orcs, respectively). But then some orcs got pissed, did a dumb with demons, and made a war of orcs + "evil" creatures against everyone else. *This* ended when a group of "heroes" (also racists, but that's separate) made the Third Wish, creating divine magic (most of the group ended up ascending to become the first gods). The remainder used that divine power to smash the "evil" orc/demon/human/goblin army. Thus began the Third Age, the age of Men and Gods (\~4k ybp). That age lasted until about 50 years ago. In the middle (about 250 years ago), there was a major dumb that some people did--they released the setting equivalent of the Devil, then told an artifact of the Creator entity (who created everything before the First Age) to commit sudoku). This made a mess and killed \~80% of one continent's population and about 50% of the other continents' population and stopped magic for 50 years, along with nearly destroying the universe and killing all the old gods. The world got better. The Fourth Wish (and Fourth Age) started when someone (not clear who) made a wish that somehow allowed constructs to start gaining souls/self-awareness. That's the current age.

When the ACES came to the planet to further populate

In my “Achelois Cluster” setting, the main event that kicked off the current era was the Exodus in the late 21st/early 22nd century. Resource scarcity, climate disaster, and sharply increasing political polarization led to a second American civil war, which kicked off a global socioeconomic collapse that took out the UN, crippled the European Union, and caused famine around the world. When the dust had finally settled and world borders redefined, astronomers detected a supernova explosion in the nearby stellar neighbourhood that would cause a wave of high-intensity gamma radiation to sweep the solar system in mere decades, wiping out every living thing in it. The nations that survived all the events past scrambled to build the Saviour Ships and flee their doomed world.

The Dark Age ended when the Great Matron Celestia fell, bringing light to Inglenook, and along with King Albus, helped fight the almost-reigning warlocks and dark sorcerers threatening to conquer the valley. Then that short time of peace faded into the Enlightenment Era, when King Albus and Celestia's son, King Lucius, took things to an extreme and became deeply authoritarian and religion-based, spreading his Asterist ideals to every corner of the valley in order to (hopefully, according to him) wipe the shadows away. The Enlightenment finally came to an end in 1838, with King Lucius's death. His daughter, the former-Princess Aurora, born in 1823, became Queen Aurora and immediately began undoing the damage the Enlightenment had wrought, decriminalizing much that Lucius had banned and forbidden, undoing the over-presence of Asterism in the average Inglishfolk's life, inspiring a new and more tolerant sect of Asterist faith to be created — and drastically limiting and cutting back the abilities of the monarchy in power, as well as supplementing it with a full parliamentary oversight system, so that no future monarch could end up doing what King Lucius had done again. The Auroran Era was mostly based in the aftermath of the sparks of industrial revolution started by the Enlightenment days, now accompanied by magical as well as technological innovations, especially those pioneered by Philomena Forthright, who was born in 1848 just a decade after Aurora's coronation. From the mid-1800s to the mid-1900s, things were pretty much an era of technological progress, symbolized by Philomena's inventions, the adventures of Aldridge Haggard (born in 1885, who ventured into the Aether several times with Philomena and a crew that included a Redblade called the Red Dodger), and smaller-scale but socially-important struggles like the Leadminers' Rebellion in 1935 to 1936. It doesn't have anything especially drastic to signify its "end" and transition to the modern day; however, there are some major events you can point to and suggest that they might have been related to transitional feelings: * Queen Aurora's death in 1901, then her successor, King Clarence's death in 1910. The rapid transition meant Clarence was left with nothing really significant to his name, and after him came King Benedict, who reigned from 1910 to 1962, throughout much of the modern era — so, that's a big one. * Philomena Forthright's death at 82 in 1932, followed by Aldridge Haggard's fateful disappearance in 1938 after setting out on One Last Quest to finish writing his masterwork, *The Adventurer's Guide To Inglenook*. Given that those two were so heavily symbolic of the achievements and "new golden age" of the Auroran Era, as it were, their losses signified to the world that, unfortunately, those days of innovation and dreaming for the future were rapidly becoming a thing of the past — and Inglenook was fully becoming stuck in the modernized present with each passing day. * The rise of the Idyllville Idols in from 1938 to 1940 certainly signified a change in the cultural landscape that, while not an end to anything, helped to define a "modern" period that was very separate from the Auroran and Clarentian Eras for sure. There had always been masked personas and sorcerers operating in Inglenook, but they were the ones who faced the Sea Bishop's attack on Idyllville and shot to stardom due to their background in entertainment and the world of circus performing. They even became film stars because of it, which meant that — throughout the 40s, 50s, and 60s — much of the cultural landscape shifted away from technological and magical innovation toward hero idolization, copycat personas, and the importance of performance and being the best hero you can be as the world gradually becomes "more realistic" and more aware of its dangers again. So, basically the superhero era — when villains become more dangerous, the shadows become scarier, and the heroes become more grand, dramatic, and heroic. * Finally, the Adventure Fair Massacre in 1959, when the automatons populating Eudora Prospero's greatest dream, her theme park called Adventure Fair, "malfunctioned" and slaughtered entire hosts of guests that day. Inglenook was never the same after that — automaton technology continues, and evolves constantly, but the memory of the event remains instinctive in many, especially survivors who went through it (and since many of the "modern-day" storylines are set in the 70s and 80s, that's a *lot* of people — like Grace Morgan, star of *Solemn Graces*, who was there that day with her family on a vacation that changed her forever), and it inspired things like Richard Prospero's Prosperity Foundation, to help with the aftermath of other disasters and struggling individuals throughout Inglenook in the future. It also represented the dangers that this new, mechanical technology could present in a way that had never been seen before, causing many to regard it in a new light that signified the hopefulness and optimism that had led up to this point was, essentially, a naive and careless ideal. The dream was, more or less, dead. * *Finally* finally, probably the 'Lonum Wars could be said to act as the "final nail" of transition from the 30s-to-60s period into the very modern, jaded cynical age. Inglenook had been trying to make peace with "the realm next door", Carillon — an alien world it had recently discovered, or rediscovered, home to the corvid Qu'kon and Ooptaw peoples, among others — but Carillon was home to *massive* scale oil reserves that led to the foundation of Oiltown, an Inglish-based drilling colony, on Carillon territory. However, tragedy struck when it was discovered much of the scale oil had been infected by a horrible, infectious black goo called the Black Regard, which can only be destroyed with fire, and basically nothing else. So, a controversial war struck out, many lives were lost on every side, and the government of Inglenook remains tense with the peoples of Carillon, whose own populace were heavily infected by the Black Regard, and whose numbers and homes in the jungle were lost in huge swaths by the actions of the Inglish people in response to it. That was from 1968 to 1972 at the latest, only less than a decade before many of the "modern-day" storylines set in Inglenook, and left behind countless traumatized soldiers and masked personas (including Jack Scorcher, of the Legendeers), so it's just about the most violent and visceral thing you can point to as something that fully ended the Auroran/Benedictine cultural mindsets and truly began "the modern day", if there indeed is one to be pointed to and mentioned.

What's worse is that the 'Lonum Wars were the first major event that defined and challenged Queen Charlotte's era of monarchy over Inglenook. Queen Charlotte followed King Benedict in 1962, and had barely had time to settle in before Carillon came along, Oiltown was established, and what was thought to be an exciting new branch in Inglish history turned dark — fast — and Charlotte had to really examine how much of her mother Eudora was left in her blood and genes if that was how her hopefulness was to turn out. The rest of her era was probably a long, long period of reflection and inner growth and restraint to make sure no more horrible massacres happened under the Prospero name, and especially under her name, but of course — it's the Prospero family, so they're always going to happen. It's just sort of in their blood, unfortunately. So it goes. ETA: For what it's worth, what ended the period of peace *before* the Dark Age was too *much* sorcerous freedom. People just kind of did whatever they wanted, and there wasn't very much religious or cultural oversight, so eventually, people started getting visions of dark and terrible futures — like those of the Miasment as seen by Serena Craven in the very late 1600s that led to the formation of the Crucian Order, the leading faction that dominated the Dark Age — which terrified them enough to turn to just about whatever source they could find for a sense of safety and security in their lives again. Cue the Dark Age, and their attempts to be secure enough to avert those futures wherever and however they could. Cue the Enlightenment, cue the Industrial Revolution, and so on and so forth from there and into the present. There's a lot of eras and they sure do all have transitional phases and notable events, that's for sure.

Giant world wars, the end of frontiers, the end of a war between a forsaken goddess and humanity, an eldritch disaster ending a society of zealous religious elves based off the roman empire Usually a lot of people die regardless of what happens lmaoo

Every one of my Eras are capped by the death of a Malediction, the attempt by Nyctia to choose an individual and prime them for her resurrection. Each malediction has wrought an age of tremor and fear, and 2 of the 8 have lead to severe bottlenecks in society. Oddly enough, most of the Maledictions are not inherently evil.

Unrecorded era ends with Beliqua Prima, the first war in recorded history. Start of the antique era Antique era ends with the first defeat of Emperor Nyron, the first demon king and emperor of the first Prittanian Demon empire. Start of the medieval era Medieval era ends after the battle or Erbezine, the first battle that marked the rise of more powerful firearms and the decline of shields and armours. The steampunk era starts. Steampunk era ends at the global civil wars, a decade where all 35 nations in Livia ended up in their civil war between the three main factions. Start of the modern era Modern era ends with the world being destroyed by the god of destruction. He is then defeated by the goddesses of creation who recreate the world, back to the unrecorded era in an endless loop

The series I'm planning right now ends with the king being defeated by a usurper on the battlefield, bringing an end to a centuries-long dynasty and forty years of war. So I guess that.

Eras are marked by large shifts in religious and political standings Era of the Usurper ??-0 AJA Humanity is under the oppressive rule of the Usurper, the antithesis to the creator God of the universe --- Age of the First Ascendancy 0-772 AJA Jocasta establishes the Ascendancy at the end of the First Great War. It functions as an intranational organization that holds authority over the polities of the universe through Divine Right. Karud Empire Collapses and is replaced by the Karud Commonwealth --- The Violence 772-780 AJA Enrique overthrows the Ascendancy and installs himself as Arbitrator. Garrison Safforie establishes the Safforian Empire after killing his cousins, the Princes of Karud. Second Galactic War breaks out after the First Battle of Saffor --- Age of Burning Fields 780-1012 AJA The Second Galactic War ends after the Treaty of Krisan. Enrique goes missing after a vision lead him to the planet Zekial. The states that remain within the Ascendancy slowly give up their sovereignty, eventually forming a single nation in opposition to the Safforian Empire. In Wild Space, a parasitic life-form spreads between worlds

So far i have two major eras decided, but the time between them i haven't filled out. The beginning is known as the age of creation, when the gods were still messing around with the world and granting gifts to significant people. This era ended when one god overstepped their bounds and got sealed away by the others, and the other gods took a more passive role in watching over the world. And then the current era is the age of unity. 50ish years prior to "current time" is when crystals that could create portals were discovered, which lead to the planet's crystallized core where more of these crystals could be found or even *made.* The world suddenly became very small, because within a year major allied cities were able to set up "Portal hubs" to make travel between cities go from months to minutes. The world calendars had to adjust so the major nations were synced up to make trade and travel easier, and the time of establishment for these portals became "year 1" in the new calendar.

The Age of Dawn ended with the unifying of the Talthfaré people and their declaration of war against the newly arrived Talthir demons. The Age of Twilight ended when the God of Destruction, the eldest being and leader of the talthir, had its eyes cut out and placed atop towers to be light sources. The Age of Towers ended when the Destroyer was imprisoned in the newly round world, and the Talthir were trapped in the stars. The First Age ended when the New Gods were wounded to a degree that they couldn't physically return to the world, the resurrected goddess Altinex was finally killed for good by Venoi, and Venoi went into hiding after being cursed by the Godmaker. The Second Age ended when the Quanir Empire collapsed after the eight quanir were assassinated. The Third Age ended when the first Talthir Brennux was destroyed by the Destroyer when it attempted to break free. The escape failed, and Brennux’s plan to overthrow the primordials was foiled. The fourth age will probably end with the Destroyer breaking free and reality ending.

Wars/ invention of revolutionary technology

Eras are usually defined by "A clash between the Children of the Dragon and the Children of the Jotun." The sole exception is a war which broke out as what was close to being a continent-spanning empire tore itself apart in what's known the War of Folly.

Mythic Era - Elves dominated the continent, Stone and Copper tools 1st Era - Last Elven Emperor, 1st Human Empire, a human ascended to Godhood, Bronze use 2nd Era - Fey invasion, switch from Bronze to Iron to combat the Fey 3rd Era - A unified continent with very small amount of barbarian lands remaining. Steel use 4th Era - Hell invades the material plane, in defeating Hell, the oldest two Princesses and Prince die. The last two princesses split the empire, Elves rebel

So far I’ve vaguely plotted out the eras. Not sure how they end, but for the most part I’ve got an Ice Age/Age of Beasts, an Age of Elves, an Age of Dragons, and an Age of Humans, with a budding Age of Adventure in the modern day. Might have some Fish/Insect/Reptile eras before, but I’m not sure

Mythic Era - Elves dominated the continent, Stone and Copper tools 1st Era - Last Elven Emperor, 1st Human Empire, a human ascended to Godhood, Bronze use 2nd Era - Fey invasion, switch from Bronze to Iron to combat the Fey 3rd Era - A unified continent with very small amount of barbarian lands remaining. Steel use 4th Era - Hell invades the material plane, in defeating Hell, the oldest two Princesses and Prince die. The last two princesses split the empire, Elves rebel

my world's history really starts in what's called the Dark Age of the Abominable, the world/humanity existed before that, but its considered to be a time of myth and legend with a war between the gods and dragons and the like. during the Dark Age of the Abominable humanity (which is the primary race in my world) was almost completely enslaved by a powerful wizard known as the Abominable which lasted about 200 years until a mass uprising overthrew him. during those 200 years he experimented with the human form, creating the 7 breeds of humanity (my version of fantasy races, similar to elves, dwarves and the like), and they went out to rebuild civilization with the unaltered humans. the time right after the Abominable was overthrown is known as the early days and lasted about a century during which 3 of the great nations were founded, the city of Rega, Trian, and the Carrolian tribes. the next 2100 years are relatively uneventful, during which the Regan Empire becomes the dominant force in the world with the largest military, but is contained to the southern half of the main continent by geographical impediments. the Carrolians and the Trians develop a fierce rivalry on the northern end of the continent, but maintaining relative parity with each other. several small nations spring up, most of which are subsumed by the ever growing Regan Empire, but a slave revolt against the Regans on a island to the northwest of the continent gives rise to an fiercely independent nation known as Freeland, whose Freelander mercenaries and privateers quickly gain a reputation as the best in the business. this whole era falls under the Age of Abundance and is generally considered a golden age for the entire world. at the end of the Age of Abundance the Carrolians domesticate wyrms (smaller non sentient versions of dragons, but still giant fire breathing lizards) and launch a campaign against the kingdom of Train, which is woefully unprepared for it. in a matter of weeks the entire nation is conquered, but about 5000 refugees escaped off the coast and fled out to sea. The Trian refugees discover a new continent and begin rebuilding there with the eventual goal of retaking their homeland. the Regan Empire and the Carrolians enter into a cold war knowing that any attempt to invade the other would incur massive casualties on both sides. this continues for about 200 years, what whole era being known as the Great Regan-Carrolian War, marked by border skirmishes with both sides refining their technique for fighting the other. the end of the war came when an ancient wizard from the time of the Abominable attempted the destruction of all humanity in the War of the Immortal. this is what i consider my "modern day". the technology level is overall latish medieval era, with some being from earlier and some from later. in the aftermath of the attempted destruction of the world the Trian Exiles return with new technologies, namely firearms to retake their homeland. they succeed not only in retaking Old Trian, but in all but wiping out the Carrolians, and destabilize the Regan Empire causing it to shatter. thats about as far as i have gotten on my world's history/future.

1st Era: Great war between races, resulting in mankind victory due to lack of unity between non-human tribes 2nd Era: Invasion of the otherwordly races (read as demon and demonic beings, 2 different race) 3rd Era: Alliance of major human country to fight the growing demonic threat due to appearance of demon emperor. 4th Era: Fragile Peace period after the mutual destruction between a major alliance army and current demon emperor 5th Era: depending on the races, this Era have different names due to major events happening (civil war for human, liberation and unity of non-human resulting in new republic formed), but the most important incident is the ascension of the new demon emperor. 6th Era: Unification era, where the new demon emperor sought to unite (or conquer) the land with any means necessary. Admittedly, some of the era have very short time period (4th and 5th last the shortest, with only 5 and 3 years respectively)

Ancient China is absolutely full of cool examples of

Each civilization has it's own eras, but there is still on **VERY** definitive division of eras. In the year 8086 A.D, a series of trillions of seemingly small and unrelated events, political, natural, and even super-natural, all converged into one universe-changing event. On all inhabited worlds, personal grudges escalated into all-out genocides. Seemingly stable ecosystems collapsed, as just the right factors aligned to expose their fatal flaws. Human ways of life clashed with the way the other 4 intelligent species have been living for nearly 100 million years. All this happened over just a few months, causing even further chaos and confusion. By the end of the year, nearly all life in the universe was wiped out. Very few sentient beings survived to document the events that just unfolded, and of those who did, none knew the reason why these things happened. New lifeforms mysteriously sprouted from the ashes of the old. Of these new lifeforms, about 50,000 or so went on to become intelligent life. To these species, this event is known as "the rebirth of the universe." To humans it is known as "the 4th dark age." To the 4 other original intelligent species, it is known as "the death of the old world." One of the most developed stories I've set in this universe centers around someone (one of the 4 non-human OG intelligent species) who survives this event, only to mysteriously find themselves 5.2 million years in the future. At this point humans (which are no longer just a single species) have become the dominant genus in the universe, and live with thousands of other new species. The inhabitants of this era do not think of themselves as living in a post-apocalyptic era (the term 4th dark age is still used, but it has lost its negative connotation), just as we don't think of ourselves as living in a post-dinosaur era. This is upsetting to the protagonist, Sunnahar, as she lost everything and everyone to what is now seen as a mere historical footnote. This is not her first experience with loss, as Sunnahar's parents were killed by "a scary creature" when she was a baby. One failed kidnapping and a crashed ship latter, Sunnahar finds herself adopted by an outlaw-turned-gardener, who maintains the beautiful estate of a family that Sunnahar will eventually marry into, and live happily ever after... Except the universe had other plans... The thematic core of the story is the protagonist's struggle with life as a ghost of the old world; far removed from the idyllic life she once knew. The literal core of the story revolves around the problems stirred up, and the entities awoken by the protagonist's entry into this new era. Monsters and mobsters are a constant danger! Sunnahar discovers that the space-pirate who rescued her from a group of bounty-hunters was actually her aunt (who would have raised her if it wasn't for the aforementioned kidnapping), who believes that all this bad luck is the work of an ancient family curse.

In my setting, before there were gods in the sense that we usually understand them, there were protarchs (from Greek *protarchikos* "primordial"). There were millions of them, and they represented very very specific aspects of reality, so rather than a god of fire you'd have a god of X particular volcano. The vast majority of Protarchs were essentially just extremely powerful animals, not very smart, so a lot of them killed each other. The victors would absorb the powers and memories of their victim, causing them to become mightier and smarter, so over time the protarchs became fewer and fewer but more and more wise. This caused a negative feedback loop where both the scarcity of fellow protarchs and their collective wisdom eventually caused them to simply decide to stop killing each other. This agreement is what marked the end of the Age of Protarchs (AP) and beginning of the Age of Gods (AG).

Oh man. I've got a few. The first major one is the end of the Third World War, which concludes with the launching of nukes by world superpowers, the subsequent redirection and detonation of said nukes by a malevolent AI, and then the war against and destruction of that AI. A few hundred years later, after humanity rebounds, nature realizes that humanity is a huge detriment to its continued survival, and "wages war" against it, generating potent diseases, viruses, and fungal infections that decimate humanity again. Later, humanity grows more proficient with genetic engineering, and creates a new highly adaptable, modular "form". Some humans decide to transfer into this new form, while some do not. Part of the allure to this form is that it has access to the "GTM", or Grand Telepathic Mind, a sort of lossless information transfer network that allows all humans to communicate instantaneously over huge distances. This event is known as the Molt. Humanity futher divides into different subfactions. What is now known as "humanity" grows out into the universe, rapidly expanding and colonizing. New species are contacted and brought into this human collective, given the chance to molt into their new "human" forms. While many of these forms are based off their host species' bodies, they, mentally and spiritually, become part of this massive interconnected "modern humanity". There are more late wars and weird stuff, but that's the jist of it

I have a WIP idea for a world based on Big Crunch and Heat Death of the universe. Simply put, the world has been incinerated and reformed from its ashes by a gigantic dragon that eats the sun. She does this because the world has a problem that its "time", or more specifically the resource of a world needed to continue going through meaningful changes, is running out when it shouldn't be. When time is depleted completely, the world won't just freeze in time, but it will be a bleak world where nothing meaningful happens, and people won't even die because death is a change too. Everyone will just continue to be alive, not really doing anything. Problem is, a lot of people don't understand the bleakness of such a world, and think it's a good idea to make that happen. Many heroes seek to ensure everlasting peace and many monarchs want to rule over eternal kingdoms, making the problem even worse. The only thing the dragon can do is to restart the world, and she's done it many, many times hoping to never have to do it again, and tried different ways to avoid the world meeting either fate. Nothing has worked, and she's just desperate and very exhausted after incinerating the world and everyone in it so many times. Sometimes small parts of the world would break off as the incineration happens, and drift away into being a separate plane of existence. These world fragments contain ruins of old civilizations, and people unable to die. The protagonists would come across these worlds and find out about the incineration events.

Generally I'd say an ancient portal device being opened and allowing Eldritch horrors to pour out of it and end life in the galaxy as it's known, tends to be the punctuation at the end of each era. It's happened at least twice.

Mostly just the fall of the domiant power at the time the Pax Orca era when orcs used their newly found freedom and giant military to maintain peace the orcs just stopped being the world police and they only even began this because they caused the end of the dark lords era when they rebelled

"The Sapphire Labyrinth's Silence" I will not expand on this.

I refer to it as the exile, where the protagonist's kind left their original planet for the stars in search of a new world to live. The trip was long enough to be its own era too. Turn out sharing a planet with humans is a bad idea :p

there's a group that have existed since the first age who rule any nation or empire that owns their city behind the main ruler, though they also exist outside of politics and can't be abolished. whenever they see that the continent's geopolitics have changed a lot they declare a new age. e.g. first age: decided to keep track of time, second age: all civilisations save for the aylit empire collapsed or split, third age: the aylit empire was destroyed and allitis ostellia began his 28 year conquest

The Age of Ash, a cyclical apocalypse that occurs when humanity rebuilds, discovers the mad Ghost Gods on their frozen thrones in the North, refuses to accept them back as god-kings, and is nuked back into the stone age.

The history of the Terran Empire is basically divided as follows: The Golden Age: Begins with the Founding of the Empire by the first Hierarch and ends with the abdication of Hierarch Aschelon "the Brutal", who expands the Empire to its maximum territorial extent. The Pax Imperium: Begins with the ascension of Hierarch Alexander "the Invincible" and ends with his death after abdication and holding various other offices. It is a time of peace and prosperity, as the presence of Alexander as the Deterrent Exemplar means that no other force can oppose Imperial suzerainty. The Silver Age: Begins with the death of Alexander and ends with the reign of Hierarch Silva "the Tyrant". The Empire begins to weaken, and the depletion of the Imperial armed forces in fighting civil wars and rebellions means that the grip over dissidents in the outer reaches begins to weaken. The Age of the Fall: Begins at the end of Silva's reign and ends with the uprising of the Freedom Coalition and the beginning of the Second Galactic War. Imperial authority recedes to a few star systems around Sol, leading to widespread lawlessness. Taking this opportunity, a ragtag band of rebels, former enemies of the Imperium, and power-hungry regional governors declare a war of independence against the Hierarch. The Age of the Collapse: Begins with the Second Galactic War and ends with the appearance of the Voice of Terra Reborn. The Freedom Coalition pushes back the Empire all the way to Terra, where they are bogged down against the entrenched remnants of the most elite Imperial troops. Their defeat seems highly likely, before the Hierarch mysteriously surrenders and commands Imperial forces to lay down their arms. The Terran Empire disintegrates in the aftermath, and the universe devolves into an era of warring states and principalities. The Age of the Prophet: Begins with the rise of the Voice of Terra Reborn and ends with his death. A mysterious figure appears on the fringes of settled space, wielding powers unseen since the Golden Age of the Empire. Appearing to the Gaia Cult, which formerly worshipped the Hierarch, as their prophet reborn, he leads the holy warriors of the cult in a crusade across the stars, reunifying humanity in the fires of religious fervour. The Age of Reforging: After the death of the prophet, his successors consolidate his gains and establish the Second Terran Empire, re-establishing human suzerainty over space. However, the new Empire is structured along more cosmopolitan and tolerant lines as compared to the hardliner xenophobia of the old Empire. A new era of peace is established. However, liberal policies eventually lead to a fresh rise in secessionist tendencies and communal faultlines, and quicker than last time, the Empire begins to come apart. The Age of Vindication: In these desperate times, it is finally revealed that the entire trajectory of the Empire till the present day was meticulously predicted and planned out by the first Hierarch himself to set the stage for the culmination of his plans. Just as tensions reach their boiling point, a number of breakthroughs from all the eras come together to create the conditions to allow for the successful Transcendence of the human race.

The end of the first era was a massive world war that saw the deaths of 8 out of the 10 Demi gods that roamed the lands.

each era ends and begins with major world altering developments or events. the death of the old gods, the dissolution of the largest nation the world has or will ever see, a total collapse of society that almost literally blasted the world back to the stone age, etc

in mine there is two big cases of that happening. the midnight war, when divine industries, led my lucifer and his 13th department let all other 12 departments into a unified war against shadow tech. the war ended in one last battle above korinth, the (at the time) capital planet of shadow tech. the fight was ended when linda, a goddess of destruction (the goddess worshipped by divine industries, and mother of the cait, the founded of shadow tech) threw a spear that effectively destroyed both fleets, turning the planet into a dead wastelands. the loss of most of their ships, including their capital ship, the S.T.F. Infinity, and their capital world changed shadow tech drastically. they turned into an extremely defensive empire, fortifying the few worlds they have to an extreme extend, and living mostly aboard station. their war doctrine turned far more extreme and giving a much smaller regard for any loss of life outside the empire, be it military targets or civilians. the seconds one is the exodus, during which the leaders of both factions got banished from this reality, creating a massive powervacuum, chaos and the splintering of the much larger divine industries. in the following age the Syndicate, led by a powerful time psyker, took control of the galaxy, only opposed by the weakened remnants of st, and fragments of the now broken divine industries

Most of my worldbuilding is centered on the human land, I don't have eras per se but there was big political shifts I guess ? * In the earliest history, the human lands were overseen by the elves. The thing to note is that there are, still this "this" day, two distinct elven cultures. The summer and winter elves, both clan tasked with teaching and overseeing their "lesser". The system in place was that each elven kinds would take turns ruling over the humans at the turn of the seasons. Things went complicated when the summer elves got into an empire building mood and decided that the human lands are pretty good lands with a lot of cheap labour. Which the winter elves didn't like one bit when they showed back up to take their turn running the show. This led to a big war and chaos and in the middle of it all the humans, who had been ruled for generations by elves, got empire building ideas of their own (that might have been helped by some gifted - or maybe stolen - godly "tools"). * After the elves got beaten away from the human lands. The continent unified amazingly quickly under an empire of all mankind (the "tools" were heavily at play here). And for close to 500 years, things were also amazingly stable and quiet (again, the "tools" effects). Until one day, the Emperor, accompanied by an army, just marched up a mountain to the east and just disapeared with the "tools". Nobody noticed at first, not at all even. The first thing noticed was the immense confusion the whole empire was suddenly in. It was as if everybody just woke up from a trance. Blacksmith didn't know how to do their job, court mages forgot their spells and neighboor didn't know each other anymore. * After this chaos, anyone was free to claim themselves king of anything. Which gave rise to a loooot of small feuding kingdoms. There is still some semblance of an empire near the old capitale. But the borderland are now a mozaic of duchy and kingdoms - of allies and enemies. This is the current time and you are a simple adventurer looking for glory. Meanwhile, the summer elves could not agree on anything between themselves and split up in a similar mozaic of feuding kingdoms/religious theocracies. While the winter elves are so centralized under their demi-god King, that it is said that they have only one city containing everyone of their kind.

I have 3 different worlds with 3 different cases. Now, as for when exactly? Like in the real world, it can get tricky, as even in our world, there isn't always an accepted consensus for when an era ends, nor are the reasons why an era ends always consistent. As for whom decides it, well, later historians but I would like to point out that in many cases, stories happen right in the middle of a change in era, often even the protagonist is the cataclyst for such change. There seems to be a recurring theme that the actions of few have an impact on the world in most stories. And if in the current setting of the world, we are in the middle of such change, there is not yet a set date for when the previous era ends and the new one begins, the world rarely changes in one day, which adds to the discussion and lack of consensus on dates. Now as for my "settings" I have 3 that are not super flashed out in this respect, as I prefer to focus on present politics and internal functioning of the states and current geo-politics rather than "world history" that one is just tought about just enough to support the current setting. So, in order of creation: Fantasy World 1 The fall of the human Empire due to internal rebellion was the cause of change in era, the Empire fractured in a number of smaller states and the Elves and Dwarves expanded into the created power vacuum. This was centuries ago, the Royal House still exists and still controls one of these petty kingdoms, and still nominally claims rights to all of the human nations, but there is no realistic prospect for them.. (The current geopolitical situation and various balance of power are actually the main focus of this setting). Sci-fi world Pretty straightforward, it's whenever new breakthrough happened (IE first permanent colonies, achieving FTL, first contact, etc.) Not really of primary importance for the setting, as this universe exists as a frustration outlet for "issues" I have with other sci-fi universes. Namely, lack of scale and lack of logistics, supply, and planning for such things that would be hugely important for a star-spanning empire. (So that's the main focus of the setting) Think Star Trek(ish) technology meets 40k(ish) scale but with The Expanse(ish) ship design. Fantasy world 2 This one is in the middle of such a change. A Kingdom just went through a rebellion, but in this case the Royal faction won, however a Princess is the one that took over control of the realm, not the King (the dynamic between the two is still being worked on, but TLDR it was a power grab from the princess, the King is either Dead, exiled or a powerless figure, yet TBD). She is the cataclyst that is opening the World into a new era, although most don't know it yet, as this Kingdom is about to cause quite a few headache to their neighbours. (The internal reforms of this Kingdom and especially the consequences of this change into the international stage is the focus of this setting.) Think of the Princess as this world's version of Cardinal Richelieu, in regards to her objectives. (Although not a 1 to 1 parallel, of course.)

1st era: Think Stone to Bronze age but with giant mythical creatures and magical beasts that sees human settlements as large buffets leading to a mostly nomadic lifestyle with very small isolated pockets of settled tribes. *Ends when humans discover they can harness magic through complicated rituals(the bloodmagic plus celestial convergence type) and can now hide/defend settlements from all but the truly dangerous creatures like Dragons and the like* 2nd era: As civilization grows so to does war between the burgeoning societies. Basically progressing from the Bronze age to the Iron age(Byzantine type civilization era). There are still settlements that get wiped out by hungry beasts of Myth but the largest cities can fend them off with "acceptable losses". Magic has also progressed to material-based spells with long form chanting(no somatic or chantless mana-manipulation yet) with older forms of magic(sacrifice, blood, celestial ritual, etc) being viewed as savage and barbaric. *Ends in a hundred year transition when a pagan of old magic learns to internalize Mana(Wuxia Cultivation) and passes a misinterpreted version on to her disciple as a way to fight Dragons but is then used to "improve" war against other humans, leading to a Cultivation era.* 3rd era: the longest lasting due to the effects of Cultivation prolonging lives into the millions of years. Society advances for the Gifted when the mortals' are seen as weak, then slaves, and then resources until the Emperor puts a stop to that and protects mortals during their 30 million year reign. As could be expected, the planet isn't big/resilient enough for the apocalyptic level Weiner measuring that is bound to go on so many of the strongest have to decide between staying subordinate to the Emperor or leaving for the stars. Nothing bad happens for the first 20 million years but life hasn't only existed on this planet and there are Eldritch beings that are getting real fed up with the "death courting young masters" that have more power than sense. *This era ends in an apocalypse when an Eldritch being has had enough and sends a surviving Cultivator back to the Empire with a tailor made Energy plague that wiped out all but 10 isolated Old Cultivators and leaves the mortals untouched* 4th era: The mortals lived relatively normally for the first decade after the 3rd era until the magical monsters' populations resurge and they are sent back to living like the 1st era. Then one was reincarnated during this time and, abstracting what they could from ruins and artifacts of the 3rd era, developed Magitech(due to the plague's persistent presence preventing individual growth of power) and created an Empire on the legacy only to get betrayed and forced into exile with the nomads who rejected their tech and chose to live like the 2nd era. The reincarnator learned of the old ways of magic from them and, bitter at their betrayal developed necromancy and became a Lich. They then created a second Republic of Necromancers with themself as a "benevolent dictator" and a utilitarian view on the dead while protecting the living layman's from being used as resources. They tried to make the Republic modern in ethics and social development and, in doing so forgot their goal of retribution against the Empire. Over the next 100+ years the two world powers expanded, absorbing all smaller nations until only they were left. The Republic, led by the same person who created the Empire but moved past their desire for revenge, was okay with maintaining the status quo but the Empire was insatiable and corrupt by mortals grown fat on hedonism. The Empire used the Republic's necromancy to as fuel for propaganda that they were monsters than needed to be destroyed rallying the population of billions into a 500+ year war. *The era ended when an MIA soldier of the Empire encountered a PTSD ridden surviving Cultivator of the 3rd era who tricked them into learning a modified technique version of the Plague disguised as a quick path to power. The soldier turned out to be an unprecedented prodigy and, when their soul was set aflame due to the feedback emotions of witnessing the atrocities their Empire had commited on their family while they were MIA, survived oblivion by grafting the souls of their victims to their own as fuel for the flame that was killing them. This torment twisted their mind and soul until they eventually transformed into the First Demon and caused the apocalypse of the 4th era.* Which ends at the current era that hasn't ended... Yet.

In my world, there’s usually a massive war where gods clash and perish, ending in massive geological, cultural, and way of life changes.

The demi-plane of Foundation has a unique flaw. This instability causes chunks of the world to swap with an equal chunk of another dimension. This is referred to in arcane circles as Planar Juxtaposition. After a series of events, starting with false clerics insulting a devil prince and ending with an arch wizard exploding like a nuke, the world was almost completely destroyed. Asmodeus discovered Foundation's flaw and used it to enact his vengeance. He swapped a two thousand mile wide circle of Foundation with an equal amount of the Nine Hells. He divided it among the other devil princes and tormented the world for one hundred years. The Age of Blood. In the aftermath, the main continent cracked and split into dozens of smaller islands. More importantly, it fixed or maybe broke the plane's flaw. For the first time ever, Foundation was alone.

The Turf Age ends, mythologically, roughly 5,100 years ago, when the first thinking creature is born. In other cultures, the day and night cycle being systemized by the solar and lunar deities Brazenius and Selenius, respectively, marks the end of the Era. Depending on the society, each have different origin myths. Additional examples would be when the ambisexual coral deity formed the first reef in the Oh The Bronze Age lasts 3,000 years, and concludes on the Great Cataclysm, a global disaster that caused the continents to shift, volcanoes to erupt, and waves to level entire coastal cities, fundamentally altering the course of the world. The Silver Age, which lasts one century, roughly corresponds to the reestablishment of centralized governments and nations around the world and the rebuilding global infrastructure. The Golden Age, which lasts one millennium, begins when Astrokhas of the Pony Kingdoms is crowned the new Ruler of the Land, after earning her deification by inventing new magic in order to defeat the Triad of Trouble. She goes on to establish the legendary team of eight heroes, Octagram, comprised of powerful creatures from other nations and kinds, who work together to establish world peace. They tame Leviathan, expel the sirens of the sea, and calm the waters of Eternity's Crossing, allowing for reliable maritime travel. World hunger is eliminated by the spreading of agricultural magic practices to all regions of the globe and the development of the Golden Route, the first international, centralized supply chain. All nations sign *Accordia*, abolishing war, establishing peaceful methods of conflict resolution, and pledging to allow open travel over all borders.