How realistic can (or should) a TL be?

I've been writing the draft for a TL which involves the Indian Ocean world in the 18th century, and increasingly I've been feeling discouraged because it feels impossible to achieve any degree of realism without being very, very knowledgeable about every corner of the world. I mean, the history of just one-half of the Indian Ocean for just 63 years merits a 1352-page book. But if you ignore effects of your POD on certain areas of the world, doesn't that effectively mean that you're setting up a 'butterfly net' around those areas, which is both unrealistic and unfair?

Thoughts? How realistically do you prefer/write your TLs? Am I aiming for too unrealistic a goal?
 
Well, I'm new but I feel vested in this answer as well given that I'm contemplating writing an ATL myself so I'll try my best to answer.

I think some degree of tunnel vision is needed-- I mean in general, you're reading because the subject matter interests you. So if you have an ATL about the Indian Ocean world it would be understandable to ignore or atleast decline to discuss other regions albeit not entirely. For instance, if your ATL takes place during the rise of European Imperialism/Colonialism in the area it would be best to atleast discuss Europe. But largely, I think it's okay to set up the "butter fly" net. It allows you to cut down on your work load while staying on topic-- but it's important to let some things "slip through" the net.

Me personally, I love history in general so I prefer more realistic scenarios and if it's too unrealistic it may belong in the ASB forum. But that doesn't mean it has to be spot on-- just within the realm of reasonable possibility. And nah man, I think this is a good goal for you-- I would love to see what you're planning! Hope I was a help man.
 
I agree with Tim Turner to an extent. At least when I read timelines, I find myself more forgiving of things I think are mildly (but not severely) improbable or strange if the timeline is very well written, whereas a poorly written timeline with minor unrealistic elements makes those elements feel all the more glaring for the flaws in the writing. Large oddities are generally more problematic. In general, major events in your timeline should be evaluated to see how badly they'd be impacted by the divergences of your timeline. Lesser events I at least personally tend to think can just sort of be muddled - either kept roughly congruent with minor butterfly divergences or mixed up wildly.

One of the more important things, and one of the things I often feel like I struggle with, is capturing the feel of the era in your writing. This, I think, often makes even more improbable changes seem possible if you can make them feel authentic.
 
It depends as someone who has his own microcosmic TL on Sengoku Era Japan, I'm not gonna bring that many changes anywhere else yet, but I'm keeping those few in mind.

I really try to be plausible to make the setting work because I'm writing a narrative story. Granted I might be a bind if can't find much so I have to make what I would feel would fit.

If your worried not covering the rest of the world do what research you can,but mainly focus what your TL covers and worry about the rest of the world later, unless some parts of foreign contact does play a role.
 
Anything a decade after the POD is almost an utter crapshoot, especially with a larger POD. It's impossible to say with any certainty the alternate careers of the major players and any supposed dark horses that crop up. You can guess the general trend things are going, but beyond that you're on pretty shaky ground.
 
I would not necessarily think that you are being unrealistic but that you want to be detailed in your TL and not produce something that would be seen as low quality. I am currently having a similar issue with the TL that I am composing but it is in a different region of the world.
 
Just butterfly everything. Invent new people, make up new events. Basically write your own story.
 
I think you should just write it and wait for the feedback. You'll get some constructive criticism (and maybe some less constructive criticism) that will let you know if you aren't coming across 'realistic enough' for most people's tastes.

From seeing some of your other posts on other threads, you seem to have enough of an eye on detail to be sufficiently plausible, especially to non-experts.

I'm personally in favour of limited parallelism. Going for complete realism is just ridiculously exhausting for any writer, especially since it means making up dozens, if not hundreds of plausible characters and names. In my timelines I tend to leave most historical personalities as they are, unless there's an obvious reason they should exist (parent killed before they were born historically), as I think it allows readers to get a better handle on how the world develops. That being said, I don't like if it feels forced (i.e. PoD in 1890 means Fascist 1940s America led by Douglas MacArthur), as it tends to be in many commercial AH works.
 
I haven't actually written a TL before so take my advice below with a grain of salt. These are my observations from thinking about TLs and reading them.

There's a banned poster from here called Abdul Hadi Pasha who has been working (and currently still is) for literal decades-most of his adult life in fact-on researching for his AH book. This is with a PoD in 1876. You can literally spend forever researching your TL because the real world is infinitely complex. You pretty much have to fudge portions to what "looks right" with only the shallowest research. It is impossible to make a truly realistic TL and the degree to which you can approach doing so decreases the father back the POD. To a large degree, AH is about fooling your audience and yourself with an illusion of plausibility.

It may help to view your TL as a permanent work-in-progress. You aren't putting up a butterfly net as much as making educated guesses until you can't anymore. Focus on the immediately relevant implications of the PoD and then fill in the blanks as the changes ripple outwards bit by bit. This will help you with researching in smaller chunks instead of all at once. Furthermore you get writing instead of getting caught in an endless cycle of research. Does your current research feel natural and flowing or top-down and artifical? Simply having the back-and forth of feedback can also provide a large boost in detailing a TL when compared to thinking about it alone.

Try to only research what you need to. If you can get away with only sketching out something, do so. If you find that something you sketched out previously contradicts new knowledge, then change it but there's no harm in having incorrect info that the reader doesn't notice. Do you really need to research South America with an 1877 Russo-Turkish war PoD? Actually you do but you don't need to do so immediately. Eventually the butterflies will become too big to ignore and you'll start seeing glaring logic issues but that can be dealt with when it happens. Before then, make broad educated guesses on the impact of the PoD and research the relevant stuff. The "relevant stuff" doesn't only include places either but also aspects of those places. For example, you might focus on the political side of your TL and then look at how cultural changes flow out from them afterwards.

(It will also help if you can articulate why you're creating this TL. What interests you about doing so? Knowing this will help you focus on what to research and how you write. There are some TL's that don't really need to go beyond 63 years for example.)
 
Something I like to do is to know what the focus of your timeline is before writing it. In my sadly defunct "Prodigal Sons" the main focus was on political developments in the state of Wisconsin. Then, I created a second circle, which was developments in the United States. Finally I had the rest of the world, which I didn't delve into too much as it took attention away from my main topics. So, in you're case, you might want to focus mainly upon the Indian Ocean and then deal with the rest of the world only where it would impact your main stage.

Another strategy is you can pic a distinctive section of the world, and expand outwards where and where it makes sense. In a second timeline I am working on, "Amalingian Europe" I started with the POD of Theodoric the Great having a son and the Goths remaining a major force in Europe. Here, rather than focusing solely on Western Europe, I have branched out to detail other sections of the world in a fair amount of detail. Usually, when I do this, I release several chapters relating to a particular region or topic. For instance, I knew that a Gothic West would have a major impact upon the Byzantine Empire and the Middle East, and so I released a series of chapters detailing that region. I also knew that the British Isles would be impacted, and so there are a few chapters dealing with Britain and Ireland. The nice thing about this is that you can create a vague notion of how you want things to go in each part of the world, and even reference it, and can then turn back and explore each topic in more detail once you have done your research and firmed things up.

In general, another thing you can do to make it seem more realistic and detailed it to form a general outline of where things are going and then drop vague references and foreshadowing for later events throughout. For instance, lets say that you are doing a timeline where the CSA wins the Civil War. You have a vague idea that the Confederacy falls to a Socialist revolt in the 1920s and that, after an alternate WWI, Britain goes fascist. You don't have all the details worked out yet, but that's where you want things to go. Well, reference those events in your narrative; have a section from a textbook entitled "The Abortive Republic: The Confederate States from Birth to Death" or do a chapter were a character is presenting a historical paper at a conference in Russian-occupied Iran. This draws the reader into the world, and by hinting at future events, builds anticipation and also helps to create a sense of a more fleshed out, realistic, world (it also can help you, as an author, by forcing you to not wander too far afield).

Does that help, a bit?
 
I haven't actually written a TL before so take my advice below with a grain of salt. These are my observations from thinking about TLs and reading them.

There's a banned poster from here called Abdul Hadi Pasha who has been working (and currently still is) for literal decades-most of his adult life in fact-on researching for his AH book. This is with a PoD in 1876. You can literally spend forever researching your TL because the real world is infinitely complex. You pretty much have to fudge portions to what "looks right" with only the shallowest research. It is impossible to make a truly realistic TL and the degree to which you can approach doing so decreases the father back the POD. To a large degree, AH is about fooling your audience and yourself with an illusion of plausibility.

This is so true! One of the timelines I'm working on now was actually birthed during my Freshman year in college when I wrote a rough drafted called "For Want of a Son" on SHWI. It just so happened that, over the next decade, I kept reading up on the topic since it really interested me (the early Dark Ages isn't my historical emphasis, but its a time period that fascinates me, and I consider a bit of a hobby). Finally, I thought it was time to give it another go and incorporate the knowledge I had learned since. I've always been terrified that, in about another twenty years, I'll want to go back and do it a third time :p

Which is another point; don't be scared of coming upon more information at a later date that will make you change your mind on how the timeline would develop. It happens to everyone, and there is a reason that there are many timelines on this board that are rewrites of ones written by authors years before. Also, I wouldn't agree with 123456789blaaa more; keep in mind WHY you are writing the timeline and what you want to focus on. Readers are going to constantly be begging for more information about parts of the world you haven't plotted out yet, and its going to be tempting to try to answer them as soon as you can. Remembering why you are writing a timeline will keep you from going too far off of your main narrative line.
 

PhilippeO

Banned
One thing i think is under-utilized in TL here is simply 'ignoring'.

When your TL is Indian Ocean, you did not need to write on TL (or answering question) about South America Politics. i seen good european TL turn to waste by blundering into various areas of the world, one TL with POD on Prussia develop to mention every SA country with its own chapter, flag, and history.

Such a thing is unnecessary, when your TL is about Indian Ocean, you need not to give explanation how China 'pull a Meiji', you could simply start when modern China started interfering in Indian Ocean itself. also while war in Europe would influence Indian Ocean, you could simply give one sentence about war major result, detail of Europe (who occupy Hesse) did not need paragraph or mention.

concentrate on your TL 'core area' detail, outside your story 'core area' as long as is not ASB, it did not need to be mentioned.
 
Another thing that is important to understand is the fact that while plausibility in real life terms is far from necessary, internal consistency is very important. Without it readers have little idea how events are progressing.
 
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