I’m curious what everyone here is using their worlds for? Are you creating them for a tabletop game experience? Are you using them as settings for your creative writing? Are they a world for video game or film? Are they an activity to escape this world for a little bit?
my story
I’m not sure I qualify as actively world building, although I’m working on finding some time for it. My focus is to build a world in which I can run dungeons and dragons campaign(s). I’m not focused on defining new races, animals, or flora. I’m reusing what is already available in that world but focused on the social/political/geographical constructs. I’m creating land for them to live, towns/cities/villages to inhabit, religious and political orders to inevitably cement disagreements, and a history of such events to motivate current affairs.
I’m maintaining it in a self-hosted dokuwiki to enable high level of cross linking all this content together.
I'm just doing it for fun mostly, but I'm mostly a conlanger so it's also in large part just to be able to give some extra flavour to my conlangs based on the culture, history, etc. of the people who speak them.
I gained an interest in DND 5E some time ago and I didn't have anyone to play with, but I read the PHB and DM guide cover to cover and decided to use that time building a homebrew setting, so I made a map and started writing some history!
I'm mostly just doing it for fun, but I might one day make a comic or write a book or something set in it. I've considered using it for TTRPGs, but it's too different from D&D and Pathfinder's default settings to really be compatible with the rules.