Creator worldbuilding and canon

Worlds and world settings

A Mystrix Studio world owns shared setting material used by its stories. Required safety profile, content rating, blocked topics, representative images, and encounter policy must be valid before the world can support publication. A draft world remains private to its owner.

In World Overview or Assets, open Cover image beside the artwork uploads to generate an image with the same provider, quote, preview and approval controls used for Story images. Describe the setting using the World's own premise and tone. Choose a provider, review the quote, then generate and inspect the result. Apply saves an approved result as the first image in the World's artwork, making it the cover. Existing artwork remains in the moodboard within the eight-image limit. Style & Voice continues to hold the separate continuity-reference workflow used to guide future images.

Each artwork card has a suggestion button beside Caption and Tags. Review the proposed wording, then choose Apply to update that field. Save details saves the card. Suggestions use the supplied World context and asset metadata; review them against the image. If the card or its context changes while a suggestion is pending, request a new suggestion.

A World being removed is unavailable for new authoring. A temporary authoring conflict can be retried after the current operation finishes. If removal cannot finish, the World and its Stories remain fenced while an operator retries cleanup; contact support if the World remains unavailable.

Story collaboration does not transfer World ownership. A Story collaborator with the relevant permission may edit that Story's characters, locations, rules, and other Story canon, but receives no access to the original creator's other Worlds. Story-owned records stay in the original creator's storage scope, are attributed to the acting creator, and are fenced if the Story's access revision changes before a write commits.

Independent characters and Story cast

Create and develop an owned character in Characters without creating a Story. One canonical profile holds its identity, role, biography, traits, goals, secrets, relationships, possessions, voice guidance and artwork. A Story attaches a reference to that Character; it does not create another profile. The Story supplies its event links, goal-completion, secret-reveal and evolution conditions, relationship actor bindings and participation. The Character's saved performer voice belongs to its global profile and is the same in every owned Story use. Story voice controls save that global choice only when you own the Character; borrowed Characters retain their accepted licensed voice. Narration has its own Story selection. Translations share the global performer. New publications freeze the selected performance without changing existing releases. An audition previews a catalogue voice without saving it. Saves verify persisted readback, and Retry recovers the original interrupted command while preserving newer edits.

If you own the Character, you can edit or Quick fix its complete profile while its owned Story use is selected. A translated use selects the Character's central localization. Those edits update the same source or localization used by other draft references. Published Story releases retain their immutable Character definition until a new Story publication. Story collaboration and a reuse licence do not transfer ownership of someone else's Character; collaborators retain their permitted Story bindings without access to the owner's private profile.

In a Story's Attach character picker, the original Story owner can choose their active Library characters or review a catalogue offer's exact terms. A collaborator with content-editing permission can choose characters already licensed for that Story. The picker shows the accepted character profile and terms; it does not open the owner's private Library or accept a new licence on their behalf. If no character has been licensed for the Story, its owner must first accept a suitable offer. An accepted licence retains its agreed character and permissions after ordinary archive or delisting, until expiry or an explicit rights withdrawal. Different approved terms remain separate choices. Attachment selects the accepted Character and its Story bindings; the picker does not author a separate role or biography. Grant permissions, expiry and withdrawal remain enforced.

Declare evolvable traits and fixed commitments on the canonical Character. Bind the traits' conditions to real events or milestones in the receiving Story. Editing Story bindings does not replace those declarations. An owned profile change needs no persona-adoption or copy step: draft references read that same Character. Current revisions protect saves, and earned bindings must still name valid declared traits. Review the revised Character against the script before publishing the Story again. Detach removes the cast attachment, preserving the library character and its images. Attach a library character once per Story. A repeated attachment returns a conflict instead of creating another actor; use the existing attachment.

Manage every Character in Characters. From a Story cast card, select the character's name to open that same workspace. The Story cast page attaches or removes existing Characters. Open the Character and choose the Story in its Story cast selector to manage that use's bindings or its owned canonical profile or localization. The selected scope stays visible. Edit owned character opens the base profile. A collaborator or borrower sees only their permitted Story use, without access to the owner's private Character.

Each draft cast card also has a Quick fix button. One click repairs the character's profile, Story bindings, behavioral guidance, portrait and voice through their canonical owners and refreshes the card. A successful repair reaches 100% and clears that character's validation findings. Missing portraits use the available house image service and your existing image spending limits. A permission, budget, provider, quality or concurrent-edit refusal appears on the card and is never reported as a completed repair. Field, structured-content and validation Quick fixes use the same one-click lifecycle: generate needed content, validate, save, read back and rerun the originating check. They preserve unrelated authored content, stable item identities and newer edits. Quick fix all performs those same repairs for every finding in its stated scope. No second review, Apply, Save or navigation step is needed. A failed or uncertain request keeps its finding visible; retry recovers the same repair instead of repeating a completed write.

The voice, pressure and comparison previews and the evolution check inspect the selected profile or Story use without changing saved canon. They remain separate from Quick fix. Published Story uses stay read-only; draft changes require Story publication before reaching readers. Character presentation publication remains independent.

World facts and rules

World facts are structured canon for every story in the world. Write one clear claim per fact and resolve contradictions before publishing instead of expecting narration to choose between them. World and location rules describe constraints that should hold during playback. For a detailed location rule, use severity to distinguish a hard constraint from softer guidance, choose how it is enforced, and state a consequence when breaking the rule should have an observable result. Guides can explain the setting to creators, but do not replace structured facts, rules, or validation.

World encounters

The world encounter switch is the master permission for cross-story encounters in that world. If it is off, a story, guest, or character setting cannot independently enable an encounter. If it is on, all later consent checks still apply: the participating stories and characters must also be eligible. Changing the master switch updates the draft configuration; published encounter profiles are rebuilt through the normal validation and publication workflow.

Character goals, fears, and secrets

Give each canonical goal a specific objective, a priority, and a timeframe. Story uses bind its stable identity to the relevant events and completion conditions. Saving the Character updates draft uses of that same source or localization; an existing published release keeps its frozen narrative until a new Story publication. Fears are pressures or situations the character tries to avoid; make them concrete enough to influence a scene without using them to override a reader's choice. Secrets are authored canon that can be revealed later. Keep each secret distinct and do not treat putting it in the character record as permission to reveal it before the story earns that moment.

Before deleting an event or its episode, remove or rebind any cast goals, secret reveal conditions, or evolution conditions that name the affected events. Studio refuses the deletion while these references remain, so the character profile and Story can still be saved and published.

Character species and body plan

Set both species and body plan before saving a new character or attaching character artwork. Species names the exact kind of subject; body plan describes its real anatomy, stance, limbs or appendages, and locomotion. For a mouse, owl, spider, or other non-human character, write those traits explicitly instead of relying on appearance notes alone. Studio preserves these values as canon so reviewers and readers can distinguish the intended subject. Use approved artwork from Studio's asset library for portraits and animation frames. Licensed performer likenesses are eligible only for the primary Character portrait. They cannot be used as alternate portraits, animation frames, references or scene artwork. Public display also requires current performer consent for the exact published Story use. Creator-approved, ready character images do not need a separate moderation approval to publish or display. Explicitly rejected images remain unavailable.

When using your own provider keys for images, Clear keys or close the Image panel to discard the generation and quality-review keys. Reopening asks for fresh keys. An action already started can still complete; use its Cancel control to request cancellation.

Applying a reviewed portrait first checks the complete Character profile, owned image sources and relationships. If those checks refuse, its previous portrait and continuity references remain selected. Fix the reported issue before trying again. If publication is interrupted after the portrait was saved, that save is retained while publication continues. When the image workspace offers Apply for a passing Character candidate needing publication review, retry that same candidate explicitly. Changed authored context or references can require a fresh review; a retry does not bypass those checks.

An asset's recovery action opens that exact asset. Retry processing retains its bytes and identity; its status remains processing until the saved asset is playable and approved. Expired uploads require explicit replacement or restart. A generated image's recovery opens its original operation in the matching image workspace. An unknown outcome stays available for reconciliation and prevents a new generation from that workspace until it is resolved.

For a generated image with repairable visual findings, Refine can use that exact owned candidate as the image to edit. Save the subject's revised art direction before generating. Refinement keeps the candidate pending until the new result passes review; choosing it as an editing base does not approve it as a portrait or continuity reference. Rejected or uncertain artwork stays unavailable.

Location artwork

In a Location's Assets page, Quick fix beside the selected image rechecks its retained pixels against the saved art brief. A passing check saves the source approval and unlocks its destination controls. The original attempt and findings stay in history. Pending generated images can be checked again; rejected or unsafe uploads stay blocked. A failed check shows its reason and keeps the finding available for retry.

Quick fix for a missing primary image reuses current approved artwork, repairs an eligible retained result, or generates the needed image using the configured service and existing spending limits. It saves the primary, reads it back and updates completeness in the same action. The art-brief Quick fix also saves its result directly; newer typing is preserved. Neither repair requires another Apply or Save.

Use as location image, Add as reference, and Use in scene remain separate choices. Checking an image alone does not change the primary, references or Stage. Editing an art brief alone does not buy an image or a new evaluation.

Character relationships

A library relationship references another existing character asset in your own library. A Story binds the relationships that participate there to exact cast members; a binding cannot target another Story's cast. Relationships to off-cast Characters remain on the canonical profile. Use the relationship type for its basic role, intensity for hostile-to-close strength, labels for facets such as trust or resentment, and notes for context. A secret relationship remains hidden from the reader until the story reveals it; it is not hidden from Mystrix Studio or validation. Detaching a cast member requires first removing active branch and timeline references. Studio removes that actor's Story relationship bindings while retaining canonical asset relationships. Archive a library character while its publications, media, or usage obligations remain. Before deleting a relationship target, remove the other library characters' references to it. An immutable published reusable profile cannot be rewritten to remove its reference; archive its target instead. If another Character mutation is in progress, wait for it to finish and retry. An interrupted mutation can require support to recover; repeatedly sending new commands does not steal its retained guard. Plot JSON replacement has its own durable recovery: it restores its exact changes before releasing its own guard. Library reads refuse while a partial replacement could expose a newly created character.

Character boundaries

Boundaries are explicit constraints on what a character should do or permit. Prefer a short, testable statement over a vague preference, and choose the editor's severity and scope to match the intended strength and situation. Boundaries guide character behavior but cannot waive content safety, ownership, consent, or publication checks.

Character voice

Voice notes keep a character recognizable across generated dialogue. Start with speech style and emotional baseline, then use vocabulary, pacing, catchphrases, words to avoid, and hard “do not say” constraints only where they describe this character consistently. Preview samples are a draft check, not saved story dialogue or proof that every later line will pass canon and safety validation.

Character chat animation

In a character's Assets tab, enable chat animation and choose managed images for its states. Arrange frames, set their durations and define the branches that fit the character. Branches can use the reply's emotion, intensity and intent, the reader's relationship, and the previous resting pose. Put specific branches first and keep an unconditional default last. A worried character can remain worried after replying.

Use the preview controls to try different contexts and inspect the selected path. Save the character, then use Publish character to approve the selected presentation for Reader chat. This does not publish Story narrative. Saving draft images or animation leaves the approved presentation selected until an explicit character publication. External grants retain the accepted immutable presentation rather than following later owner changes. Disabling animation in Studio restores the still portrait after character publication. Main chat plays the authored reactions automatically and respects the device's reduced-motion setting. Animation failures do not prevent reading or sending text.

Location map

The story location map positions owned draft locations and records their connections. Use it to make travel and adjacency understandable, but do not use a visual connection to contradict a location rule or the authored timeline. Map changes stay in the draft until the next validated publication, while an already published location snapshot remains fixed.

Location sensory palette

The sensory palette records what a scene at the location can sound, smell, look, and feel like, including soundscape, light, texture, smell, and air quality. Choose a few distinctive, compatible cues rather than filling every field with conflicting detail. Sensory guidance enriches description; it does not change story state, location rules, or the reader's decisions.