subjunctive mood vs future tense

[bbbosborne]

while working on my conlang, I created a subjunctive mood and a future tense for verbs. I realized they clashed unfavorably since they both mean a future action. I came up with a solution/idea that future tense verbs will definitely occur, and the subjunctive mood (for this conlang) indicates actions that may or may not occur.

are there any known languages in the world that also have this system?

[Vijay]

I'm not sure I understand. How is that different from Romance languages?

[bbbosborne]

i came up with the idea since different languages use the subjunctive mood differently. it could mean something like possibilities or it may not. if you meant that my idea is the same as what romance languages do, it was a complete coincidence. I didn't know romance languages also did that (but now I do, so thanks).

[Vijay]

I mean, idk, it sounds to me pretty much like what Romance languages do.

[zompist]

Subjunctive/irrealis forms work in all kinds of ways. There's a section on this in Advanced Language Construction.

In particular, the future is often an irrealis form, though it may be one of an array of such forms.

For Romance languages, it'd probably be more accurate to say that the subjunctive refers to hypothetical events: jussives, obligatives, speculatives, presuppositions.

In French, if you want to suggest that a future event is unlikely, it may appear in the imperfect or the conditional.

If the primary distinction you want to make is likeliness/unlikeliness, you may possibly have an evidential instead. (How do you talk about unlikely events in the present?)