Today, I was writing out the political system of my kingdom, including a major change from the previous edition.
There is a border war that is part of the key background to this story. In the previous version of this story, I had the rival kingdom be dragon riders because tropes! But I should have seen it coming from the beginning that without any clear reason for them existing and with the plot being focused in the kingdom without dragons, it was a pretty stupid move. I was setting up this trope but leaving it out of the story – worse I was probably distracting future readers by teasing dragons but making them a distant and largely irrelevant enemy.
Now with less dragon.
I have taken the dragons out of the equation. They deserve their own story, which is great, I have an idea for the next series after this one. Now, the rival kingdom is a breakaway of the kingdom where my action is occurring, which keeps the story focused where it should be. On my hero and her problems, which are all domestic.
I also went back to establish why my royal family is in charge and what the local conflicts are and where they emerged. Most importantly – and I’m really proud of this – I didn’t over-complicate the crap out of it. My kingdom history is simple enough now (at least in its current state) that no info dump is required, but clear enough to inspire a civil war. Mischief managed.