General Discussion

[Darkness Ascendant]

On 2017-5-20 at 3:34 PM, Lindel said:

They are created by the mind of the Dreamer. They are self-aware. For all intents and purposes, they are "real" people, and getting any further into the question about the nature of their existence and whether they have "souls" is something that can't be explained even by the "science" of their world. I have my own theories, but I'm choosing to leave that as an open, unanswerable question. Typically, the Dreamer doesn't directly control the shaping it of the world, it takes shape based on their mind, but they don't actively, consciously create anything. In many cases, the Dreamers themselves aren't fully aware of their role in the world that's been created around them. In Stratvale, the space faring sci-fi Anomaly, the Dreamer is reincarnated throughout the history of his world, but he basically becomes a new person each time, without any memory of his past lives. In the high-fantasy D&D Anomaly, Eovale, the three Dreamers became the original gods, called the Old Ones. They originally held onto some of their past memories, and they actively shaped the world within the bounds that was set at its inception. Their active role in the Anomaly is part of what made it especially vulnerable to metaforms. As millennia passed within Eovale, the Dreamers started to forget where they had come from and what they had once been. In comparison to eons as omniscient gods, their previous lives as mortals faded. In my current campaign, taking place in the Anomaly I'm calling Duskvale, the Dreamer is schizophrenic, and has become infected by two metaforms, Dusk and Onyx, which are at war inside his mind. He's aware that the world seems to revolve around him, but doesn't really understand why. So, to answer your question, it really just depends. Each Anomaly is fairly unique in most aspects, with certain connections and shared rules.

Perhaps the more people created in an Anomaly, the further a Dreamer's mind is split and fragmented among those they created, so like an independent hive mind, but not quite. They have their own thoughts, but are connected to the Dreamer. And the more intelligent/advanced they become, the more mentally redundant and simple the Dreamer becomes etc etc

[Lindel]

11 hours ago, Darkness Ascendant said:

Perhaps the more people created in an Anomaly, the further a Dreamer's mind is split and fragmented among those they created, so like an independent hive mind, but not quite. They have their own thoughts, but are connected to the Dreamer. And the more intelligent/advanced they become, the more mentally redundant and simple the Dreamer becomes etc etc

Ooh, that's an interesting concept, I like it! 

[StrikerEZ]

I've come up with three kind of interesting ideas for magic systems recently, though they're still fairly new.

The first one is actually an idea I had a long while back, but I never could figure out how to make it work well. I randomly thought of the idea again, while reading The Way of Kings, when it mentioned the symmetry of the ten kingdoms (sorry, already forgot what they're called). Anyway, the idea is that of the mirror realm, which sounds a lot like you'd expect. Of course, there's no people when you enter, and your reflection doesn't appear in the real world once you're in the mirror realm. Now, I think the cool thing is that, while you do have to touch the mirror in order to go to the mirror realm, you can use any object to do so (except living creatures-though dead bodies can be pushed through). The more reflective, the easier it is to push into the mirror realm. Of course, you can't bring the object you push through with you (for example, if I pushed against my shirt, and was actually successful, I'd travel through my shirt, but I'd leave it behind and be shirtless in the mirror realm.). Though, if you were powerful enough, it would be possible to push through the air itself or even create an open portal that everyone could go through, not just Mirrorers (I'll come up with a better name). In the mirror realm, time is funky. Sometimes, it acts like time in the real world, but it rarely does that. Most of the time, it behaves inversely with how you perceive time to pass-if you feel it to pass more slowly in the mirror realm, it will have actually passed very quickly, and vice versa. You can't spend too much time in the mirror realm, however; the longer you're in there, the more you 'fade,' a process where you slowly turn into nothing. 

Another, less thought out idea, is kind of similar to allomancy, except it involves all of the transition metals. You stab a piece of the metal into yourself, and it grants you powers. Of course, you have to deal with blood loss, possible metal poisoning, etc. And the metal only grants you powers if you have specific DNA (though there's nothing like Mistings or Ferrings). For example, a piece of iron stabbed into you would grant you the ability to control gravity around yourself, titanium gives you super strength and enhanced durability and endurance, and silver gives you the ability to turn invisible.

The other idea is even less fleshed out. It involves what I call the shadow realm, a place where, obviously, there is nothing but shadow. In this realm, there live the Shadowbeasts. They're strange, almost humanoid monsters. They're not perfectly human, though they are intelligent and can speak and interact with humans. The only way they can interact with the real world is through the shadow crystals. Around these crystals, there is a link between the two realms; the real world and the shadow realm.

Edited May 22, 2017 by StrikerEZ

[Faceless Mist-Wraith]

1 hour ago, StrikerEZ said:

The first one is actually an idea I had a long while back, but I never could figure out how to make it work well. I randomly thought of the idea again, while reading The Way of Kings, when it mentioned the symmetry of the ten kingdoms (sorry, already forgot what they're called). Anyway, the idea is that of the mirror realm, which sounds a lot like you'd expect. Of course, there's no people when you enter, and your reflection doesn't appear in the real world once you're in the mirror realm. Now, I think the cool thing is that, while you do have to touch the mirror in order to go to the mirror realm, you can use any object to do so (except living creatures-though dead bodies can be pushed through). The more reflective, the easier it is to push into the mirror realm. Of course, you can't bring the object you push through with you (for example, if I pushed against my shirt, and was actually successful, I'd travel through my shirt, but I'd leave it behind and be shirtless in the mirror realm.). Though, if you were powerful enough, it would be possible to push through the air itself or even create an open portal that everyone could go through, not just Mirrorers (I'll come up with a better name). In the mirror realm, time is funky. Sometimes, it acts like time in the real world, but it rarely does that. Most of the time, it behaves inversely with how you perceive time to pass-if you feel it to pass more slowly in the mirror realm, it will have actually passed very quickly, and vice versa. You can't spend too much time in the mirror realm, however; the longer you're in there, the more you 'fade,' a process where you slowly turn into nothing. 

This sounds interesting. For clarification, do objects on your person not transfer to the mirror realm when you do? From what you are saying it sounds like they don't, but does this extend to clothes?

1 hour ago, StrikerEZ said:

The other idea is even less fleshed out. It involves what I call the shadow realm, a place where, obviously, there is nothing but shadow. In this realm, there live the Shadowbeasts. They're strange, almost humanoid monsters. They're not perfectly human, though they are intelligent and can speak and interact with humans. The only way they can interact with the real world is through the shadow crystals. Around these crystals, there is a link between the two realms; the real world and the shadow realm.

This sounds similar to the magic system in Garth Nix's Seventh Tower series. Do the crystals form naturally or are they man-made?

[StrikerEZ]

27 minutes ago, Faceless Mist-Wraith said:

This sounds interesting. For clarification, do objects on your person not transfer to the mirror realm when you do? From what you are saying it sounds like they don't, but does this extend to clothes?

This sounds similar to the magic system in Garth Nix's Seventh Tower series. Do the crystals form naturally or are they man-made?

To the first point, objects do transfer over. As long as you don't use them to travel to the mirror realm, of course. So, you're clothes would stay on you, as long as you used a different object to travel through, if that makes sense.

Seventh Tower? I haven't heard of that one. I loved his Old Kingdom series, so I might need to read that.

Both. They form more naturally, but it's possible to make them.