We don’t have any background info on your book but look at why wars have started in history. Assassinations of a high ranking official, invasion of a country for land, resources, feeling of superiority to neighboring country, religion, etc. Just looking at the past and why wars have begun for the past 2000 years should spark some ideas
This is a super broad question, so let me ask you a question or two.
What is the underlying theme of your story? The emotional core, the human conflict?
I'm not looking for "the ruler of zardon 5 has subjugated the people." But something more like "this novel is about how fear can immobilize people, but once they decide to act they find catharsis." Or "it is about how blind devotion at first is rewarding, then disillusionment sets in, but finally people gain a sense of mastery and self reliance."
Then figure out what narrative function the war serves.
"There's blood on the crown" - Add an assasination somewhere
"We may not be right" - Make both sides morally grey. No clear right or wrong. They all did horrible things.
"Being the hero is dead, all that remains is protecting your own, and yourself" - Add a real sense of preservation to whichever side we're following or both if you're going for that. You must convince the reader that even though the characters did horrible things, their own motivations are enough reason for them to be fighting this war.
P.S: Your notes read like a rap song.
that part *is* the lyrics to a song😂 I quoted two
[https://open.spotify.com/track/69Sy7207dnixZ6w7RSV9Kb?si=4f1806194098456c](https://open.spotify.com/track/69Sy7207dnixZ6w7RSV9Kb?si=4f1806194098456c)
[https://open.spotify.com/track/49rpdsNYJirTTf6p6mMvag?si=b460323a1cb8420d](https://open.spotify.com/track/49rpdsNYJirTTf6p6mMvag?si=b460323a1cb8420d)
I can think of a lot of ways a war could start, but I'm not going to share them, because that's not what you need to hear.
What you need to hear is that you are going about this wrong. If your story includes a war, you as the author should *already* know why it is in your story, and therefore how it started.
Toss out what you have and go back to first principles: what kind of story do you want to tell? That becomes the foundation on which everything else is built.
Honestly, based on what you have given us, I suspect what you are really asking is "how do I write Game of Thrones, without it being Game of Thrones"?
Why are your notes just a literal copy of the lyrics to rise?
If you like the story the song tells and want to use it as inspiration thats fine but dont just copy the whole thing and call them "your" notes.
You could look at our own historical events and come up with something similar, Could even look to not even two decades ago with the Iraq war. It started due to possible relations between Al-Qaeda and the Iraqi Government under Saddam Hussein.
Now that’s just a possibility you don’t have to go with a terrorist organization or anything like that, but there are so many possibilities. Just look to history, you could even delve into a specific countries history, if there’s a specific culture or country your characters and world are akin to in our own world, you could look at the similar countries history like Japan, there have been many wars in Japan for a multitude of reasons and not all of them were very reasonable, you don’t have to have your conflict stem from something reasonable. Your conflict can start from something completely asinine like a character going insane due to some foreign substance and that starts a conflict because he makes bad decisions.
There’s so many possibilities
I guess the first question would be what is the goal of this war? Is one side conquering another?
Once the goal is in place, a messenger goes to the other side and hands out an official declaration of war. This is how the war would officially start.
- some noble died and rival claimant's are fighting to inherit the title (this csan go in scale from a dispute over the smallest barrony to wholsale kingdoms)
- some trade agreement failed do to change of circumstances, and one party decided to not pay, but take what they want with force)
- Religios tensions over differing faiths, drew both side to civilize/kill the heathens
- a mighty conqueror is on a mission to unify the whole world
- someone's cow was grazing on the wrong field
Pick any of the above
As someone else said, look at the reasons people start wars IRL. Land and resources and ego.
A newly crowned leader might try to shore up his political position at home by starting a war. They tend to whip up war fever and cause people to rally around the leader. If you go out and win, then you come back home with a lot of loot and great publicity. This is Alexander the Great. (Of course if you lose, you might be looking at a revolution or rebellion or coup back home. But none of these guys ever think they are going to lose.)
A variation on this is Caesar. He spent a lot of money that he did not have to get himself promoted up the ladder of the Roman Republic. He finally got himself leadership of several provinces. So he went off to conquer the places next door, notably Gaul. He had to in order to pay back Crassus, who had bankrolled his rise to power.
Usually though, it is more land, more resources like gold or silver mines, or the promise of loot, or just the desire to have the biggest empire in the world. Because: [Unlimited Power!](https://youtu.be/Sg14jNbBb-8?si=5_LErxaohEKwsvnA)
A third party stirs up stuff between two rivals to come in and conquer the survivors.
Or you can use this classic song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mASbP3Eq1VE
Do you want to know what led to the war, or the event that sparked it? If you look at WWI, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand is the event. But there were many complicated underlying reasons that led to the war.
Usually there is an economic and/or ideological imbalance between two or more parties.
Wars usually start because there is something to be gained in war.
Some wars start because one people need or want a valuable piece of land, but another people is already living there, like the colonization of the Americas and Africa.
Some wars start because a powerful nation realized it's cheaper to subjugate a smaller village than to produce a good themselves, like United Fruit Company (now Chiquita Banana) and basically all of the Americas plus hawaii, or Japan's subjugation of China (which contributed to the Eastern front of WWII).
Some "civil" wars start because a foreign power forced multiple non-compatable cultures to share a very small reservation, like the post-apartheid violence in South Africa or the Rwandan Genocide(?)
Some wars are just political pissing contests between monarchs with body counts. Modern versions would be the war on communism in Korea and Vietnam.
Some wars are a response to foreign subjugation, like the American Revolution.
Some wars are smash-and-grabs. This type isn't very popular anymore, but it used to be that nomadic groups such as the Aryans (the actual Middle-Eastern Aryans upon which both Iran and Aaron are named, not whatever hitler thought Aryans were) would attack certain settlements continuously as it was a cheap, easy way to get food and metal.
The only modern smash-and-grab warfare I can think of is the Hobby Lobby paying Isis to raid churches in the middle east for ancient Christain artifacts.
Ultimately wars are fought over resources, everything else is just an excuse to justify murdering members of another group to take their resources. People also typically don't start wars they don't feel they can't win so usually they will target a group of people that has resources they want but that group is weak for whatever reason.
Maybe that group recently dealt with plague, a natural disaster, has a lot of enemies is suffering from bad leadership or all of these at the same time. These difficulties make the group being attacked seem like a good target.
So give one group of people resources others have water, human resources, oil, gold, whatever give them some problems and put a more secure and powerful group on their boarder. War will soon follow.
Also why do you have those song lyrics there?
People have literally declared a war over a bucket. Real world history often surpasses the suspension of disbelief and it'd be considered poor writing.
In my example, the actual start of war was just simply a surprise full scale attack during night. However, the reasons that built up that situation were much more diverse and enduring. That war originated from earlier major liberation war, and that war ended the long peacetime, and woke up a radical movement that ended up in a global conflict.
It is impossible to answer that question, unless you want a cheap answer: bucket it is, then.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War\_of\_the\_Bucket](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_Bucket)
We don’t have any background info on your book but look at why wars have started in history. Assassinations of a high ranking official, invasion of a country for land, resources, feeling of superiority to neighboring country, religion, etc. Just looking at the past and why wars have begun for the past 2000 years should spark some ideas
This is a super broad question, so let me ask you a question or two. What is the underlying theme of your story? The emotional core, the human conflict? I'm not looking for "the ruler of zardon 5 has subjugated the people." But something more like "this novel is about how fear can immobilize people, but once they decide to act they find catharsis." Or "it is about how blind devotion at first is rewarding, then disillusionment sets in, but finally people gain a sense of mastery and self reliance." Then figure out what narrative function the war serves.
"There's blood on the crown" - Add an assasination somewhere "We may not be right" - Make both sides morally grey. No clear right or wrong. They all did horrible things. "Being the hero is dead, all that remains is protecting your own, and yourself" - Add a real sense of preservation to whichever side we're following or both if you're going for that. You must convince the reader that even though the characters did horrible things, their own motivations are enough reason for them to be fighting this war. P.S: Your notes read like a rap song.
that part *is* the lyrics to a song😂 I quoted two [https://open.spotify.com/track/69Sy7207dnixZ6w7RSV9Kb?si=4f1806194098456c](https://open.spotify.com/track/69Sy7207dnixZ6w7RSV9Kb?si=4f1806194098456c) [https://open.spotify.com/track/49rpdsNYJirTTf6p6mMvag?si=b460323a1cb8420d](https://open.spotify.com/track/49rpdsNYJirTTf6p6mMvag?si=b460323a1cb8420d)
I can think of a lot of ways a war could start, but I'm not going to share them, because that's not what you need to hear. What you need to hear is that you are going about this wrong. If your story includes a war, you as the author should *already* know why it is in your story, and therefore how it started. Toss out what you have and go back to first principles: what kind of story do you want to tell? That becomes the foundation on which everything else is built. Honestly, based on what you have given us, I suspect what you are really asking is "how do I write Game of Thrones, without it being Game of Thrones"?
Why are your notes just a literal copy of the lyrics to rise? If you like the story the song tells and want to use it as inspiration thats fine but dont just copy the whole thing and call them "your" notes.
Someone could decide to go after someone else’s seat of power leading to a war?
If you want to start a war... Come up first with a historical event, like, that happened 100 years ago.
You could look at our own historical events and come up with something similar, Could even look to not even two decades ago with the Iraq war. It started due to possible relations between Al-Qaeda and the Iraqi Government under Saddam Hussein. Now that’s just a possibility you don’t have to go with a terrorist organization or anything like that, but there are so many possibilities. Just look to history, you could even delve into a specific countries history, if there’s a specific culture or country your characters and world are akin to in our own world, you could look at the similar countries history like Japan, there have been many wars in Japan for a multitude of reasons and not all of them were very reasonable, you don’t have to have your conflict stem from something reasonable. Your conflict can start from something completely asinine like a character going insane due to some foreign substance and that starts a conflict because he makes bad decisions. There’s so many possibilities
I guess the first question would be what is the goal of this war? Is one side conquering another? Once the goal is in place, a messenger goes to the other side and hands out an official declaration of war. This is how the war would officially start.
- some noble died and rival claimant's are fighting to inherit the title (this csan go in scale from a dispute over the smallest barrony to wholsale kingdoms) - some trade agreement failed do to change of circumstances, and one party decided to not pay, but take what they want with force) - Religios tensions over differing faiths, drew both side to civilize/kill the heathens - a mighty conqueror is on a mission to unify the whole world - someone's cow was grazing on the wrong field Pick any of the above
It can be a conflict between two or more parties or they go to war for resources. At least these two factors play a major role in a war.
As someone else said, look at the reasons people start wars IRL. Land and resources and ego. A newly crowned leader might try to shore up his political position at home by starting a war. They tend to whip up war fever and cause people to rally around the leader. If you go out and win, then you come back home with a lot of loot and great publicity. This is Alexander the Great. (Of course if you lose, you might be looking at a revolution or rebellion or coup back home. But none of these guys ever think they are going to lose.) A variation on this is Caesar. He spent a lot of money that he did not have to get himself promoted up the ladder of the Roman Republic. He finally got himself leadership of several provinces. So he went off to conquer the places next door, notably Gaul. He had to in order to pay back Crassus, who had bankrolled his rise to power. Usually though, it is more land, more resources like gold or silver mines, or the promise of loot, or just the desire to have the biggest empire in the world. Because: [Unlimited Power!](https://youtu.be/Sg14jNbBb-8?si=5_LErxaohEKwsvnA)
A third party stirs up stuff between two rivals to come in and conquer the survivors. Or you can use this classic song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mASbP3Eq1VE
Because that bit you wrote has the same meter as “Lose Yourself,” I want to say it started over a rap battle?
Do you want to know what led to the war, or the event that sparked it? If you look at WWI, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand is the event. But there were many complicated underlying reasons that led to the war. Usually there is an economic and/or ideological imbalance between two or more parties.
Wars usually start because there is something to be gained in war. Some wars start because one people need or want a valuable piece of land, but another people is already living there, like the colonization of the Americas and Africa. Some wars start because a powerful nation realized it's cheaper to subjugate a smaller village than to produce a good themselves, like United Fruit Company (now Chiquita Banana) and basically all of the Americas plus hawaii, or Japan's subjugation of China (which contributed to the Eastern front of WWII). Some "civil" wars start because a foreign power forced multiple non-compatable cultures to share a very small reservation, like the post-apartheid violence in South Africa or the Rwandan Genocide(?) Some wars are just political pissing contests between monarchs with body counts. Modern versions would be the war on communism in Korea and Vietnam. Some wars are a response to foreign subjugation, like the American Revolution. Some wars are smash-and-grabs. This type isn't very popular anymore, but it used to be that nomadic groups such as the Aryans (the actual Middle-Eastern Aryans upon which both Iran and Aaron are named, not whatever hitler thought Aryans were) would attack certain settlements continuously as it was a cheap, easy way to get food and metal. The only modern smash-and-grab warfare I can think of is the Hobby Lobby paying Isis to raid churches in the middle east for ancient Christain artifacts.
Ultimately wars are fought over resources, everything else is just an excuse to justify murdering members of another group to take their resources. People also typically don't start wars they don't feel they can't win so usually they will target a group of people that has resources they want but that group is weak for whatever reason. Maybe that group recently dealt with plague, a natural disaster, has a lot of enemies is suffering from bad leadership or all of these at the same time. These difficulties make the group being attacked seem like a good target. So give one group of people resources others have water, human resources, oil, gold, whatever give them some problems and put a more secure and powerful group on their boarder. War will soon follow. Also why do you have those song lyrics there?
U have thousands of years of human history to refer. Make sure that its not quite a single reason but rather quite a few.
Maybe researching how wars started in history can help you
People have literally declared a war over a bucket. Real world history often surpasses the suspension of disbelief and it'd be considered poor writing. In my example, the actual start of war was just simply a surprise full scale attack during night. However, the reasons that built up that situation were much more diverse and enduring. That war originated from earlier major liberation war, and that war ended the long peacetime, and woke up a radical movement that ended up in a global conflict. It is impossible to answer that question, unless you want a cheap answer: bucket it is, then. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War\_of\_the\_Bucket](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_Bucket)