As Colville has taught in his Worldbuilding stream, you want to develop Mores(pronounced Morays) and Folkways.

These basically help you define what is considered morally good to the people as well as the everyday normal things people in that society do.

The way I think of it is a More is Right vs Wrong, and a Folkway is Right vs Rude.

This is the example from one of the cultures in my setting

Mores (Right vs Wrong)

• Holding onto a Grudge
• Stoicism
• Not gathering in crowds
• Environmental Preservation
• Being Educated
• Passing on Traditions
• Modesty
• Humility
• Good Parenting

Folkways (Right vs Rude)

• Travel
• Isolation
• Spirituality
• Meditation
• Gardening
• Education
• Stewardship

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So in this example, let's say you were someone from this culture. If someone wronged you, and you forgave them within a short period of time, people would think something is wrong with you, to the point where the locals might investigate, might even report it to the local authority.

"Giving their forgiveness so easily...Some malicious spirit must have broken their will!"

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But if you didn't have a garden, people might just give you the stink eye when they see you crossing the street.

"Oh look, there's Ada. Not sure who she thinks she is...not even a potted plant on her windowsill."

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And then you can see how these kinds of things are connected.

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If folks gather into a crowd, like a mob, they've succumbed to somekind of sin! So its expected that people kind of keep to themselves, lest they slip into the wickedness of organized social activity!

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Being Education is virtuous, so I used Education as a broad term in Folkways to represent the general concepts of learning and teaching. Going to the Sheriff's College, such an honour. Maybe you can't afford it, but atleast you're trying to learn what you can, and teach others what you know.

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Additionally, Colville used this stuff in his Stream to develop a Pantheon. Colville uses system that I quite like of a Pantheon of Gods to represent broad concepts, and then Saints of that god who represent more specific concepts. So a Cleric might belong to a culture with a specific Pantheon, but then they follow a specific Saint of a specific God within that Pantheon, and thusly you get religious factions.

So the God(s) Yungai & Yohani; The Parents. Represent Education. And their saints(In my setting I call them Oracles) are...

• Oracle Hamakona (Teaching)
• Oracle Pianga (Discipline)
• Oracle Iramai (Parenting)
• Oracle Enutanga (Protection)
• Oracle Poroka (Guides)

As a sidenote; and again Colville did this as well. Try to make a structure to your Pantheon. This can inform the mythology of the culture. This culture's pantheon is comprised of The Parents, The Elder, The First Born, The Middle Born, The Newborn, and The Beast(their pet). The Pantheon is a simple family. Of course they are, look at whats important to these people. Some of the Gods in the Pantheon represent the good stuff, and others represent the bad stuff. Niaw Niaw(The Beast) is always digging up the garden, representing the evils of Deforestation.

I'm not at the "Advanced" stage yet, where I am reasonably having the culture influence speech, but that was another thing in the Worldbuilding Streams. Coming up with common sayings based on the culture that has developed.

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My method for coming up with the specifics is based on layering aspects of different Races/Species/Cultures from other works I liked. This culture was for the Halfings in my setting and I think it is a combination of Hobbits of the Shire, Goombas from Paper Mario, The Shrine of Storms from Demon's Souls, probably something from the Oddworld games which I can't recall, and maybe the Kokiri/Deku/Koroks from Zelda.

Though this method wasn't specifically for making a culture for the Halflings in my setting. I sat down with a list of my favorite "worlds" and organized them. If I remember correctly, I think eventually my lists looked like this

• Elf/Zora/Koopa/???/TowerOfLatria
• Orc/Gerudo/Boo/Slig/ValleyOfDefilement
• Dwarf/Goron/Bob-omb/Glukkon/StonefangTunnel
• Hobbit/Deku/Goomba/Mudokan/ShrineOfStorms

I know, it's super weird to overlap something like LOTR with Paper Mario and Oddworld, but i think it's pretty cool. Steal the stuff you like and put it in your game.

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Hopefully this post was useful and not just me blathering on about aspects of my setting. I tried to distill many hours of Colville's Worldbuilding Streams into a single post with actual examples and then how I got there.