kenod
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Everything posted by kenod
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Haha. I'm big stupid and put it in a quote box.
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Added it. Also, I created a google doc for characters, and linked it to the planning sheet (Link to character doc). This will make it easier to keep track of, since I can't edit the OP. Also, this document is editable by everyone, but please post new characters or character edits here as well, since it'll make it easier for everyone to see them.
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So what would the purpose of this be? I can't really see anyone using a spell to change spiritual gender, since you're basically altering your soul for no good reason. The only usages for this I can see are really dark ones similar to conversion therapy, or reducing gender equality by forcing anyone who wants a "man's" job would be forced to change their gender. Sounds good. Once we're there, do you have a plot hook to get us to meet and/or group up? We might also want to just have the characters form a few small groups (2/3 people) first, and then expand later.
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Nice. Added her her to the unofficial list. As for the Innate magic, I'm not sure how that'll work, but the the current state is like this (I think, but it'll probably change a bit): Innate magic is divided into two types, Ritual and Natural. A person can only have one type. Ritual side: A person who looks at a symbol has an instinctive knowledge of what the symbol does, and can see symbols around things affected by Natural magic or enchantments, knowing their effects, and possibly being able to copy these symbols. Natural side: A person will get a type of aura vision, being capable of seeing the emotions of people, as well as their health and other details like if they have magical abilities. They can also see how magical energy flows, and where it concentrates, being able to map ley lines and find hot spots, and might also be capable of sensing spirits and other magical beings/objects. Weirder variations might possibly exist if Natural magic or Soulworking starts interfering with this? Not an actual established thing, just me questioning if we want this. These two types are generally divided among gender lines (guessing Ritual being male and Natural being female?), but it isn't an absolute, and there are a fair number of Innates with the type that is normally reserved for the other gender. It isn't known if mental gender affects what an Innate is born with (read, decide for yourself when creating non-cisgendered characters) but Fleshcrafting (read, gender reassignment spells) isn't capable of changing the type of Innate magic a person has.
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Seems interesting, and might also have the potential to grow into a larger plot (or at least get the gang together). My only question is why our characters would be allowed to help. For some it would be fairly simple, since Sayers would be logical to call, and a Mage from the Academy helping would make sense as well, but having strangers help out with this would seem rather weird, since these mines sound like the type of thing that would be a fairly sensitive matter, that you don't want strangers to interfere in, let alone some of our weirder characters.
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It's probably good to keep in mind that they'd be rather restrained in what they can actually do, since, the other gods could probably block them from taking certain actions, and they are forced to act according to certain believes. There's also the fact that actions not considered part of their sphere of responsibilities might have... unfortunate effects on them. For example, the personification of death might not really like a minor god of grain trying to resurrect the dead, or make all their followers completely immortal.
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Alright. How much influence would the religions have? Would they mostly have informal influence, by advising the counselors, or do they have an actual seat in the council, and if so, which religions have one?
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Alright. So I'm guessing that going by that, they'd probably have a representative that talks to the government, possibly with a symbolic seat on the governing council, but don't wield much direct influence. So I'm guessing that the representative would normally be from the main academy, since that is where most of the more powerful mages will be concentrated, and since every mage will have studied there they'll also all be connected to it, making communication easier, and making it more logical for them to take a leading role.
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So I decided to go through the thread and compile a basic list myself: @MacThorstenson: Mak @Steel Inquisitive: Jürgen Jäger @Turtle373: Chadwick, The Wolf @ZincAboutIt: Aldred, The Itinerant @kenod: Lilia Blumenkind @Sorana: Amara So currently the party includes a Wizard, a Hunter, a Hound (the hunter's companion?), a Cleric(?), an Elf/Druid (sort of), and a Healer.
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Alright. Do you have any suggestions for how the mages could figure into local politics? Unrelated note, can we compile a list of characters people have submitted?
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True. On the other hand, you can also just siphon gas from the gas giant the moon orbits around for the. Or if the moon was large enough (a bit heavier than earth), then the original planet could still be there, but the layers would be added on top of it, only needing a small amount of additional mass (or possible no additional mass). You'd still need fuel for electricity though, active support requires a lot of it, even with easy access to room-temperature supercomputers.
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You can also go the other way around, turn the center of the planet into a giant canister of compressed fusion fuel, which creates the gravity. You can then build shells around that using active support. The mass of the different layers should actually mean each layer has the same surface gravity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shellworld
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So, small issue with this. Wouldn't using spin gravity make gravity get gradually lower as you get to a higher latitude? Also, it means that any direction you're walking in that isn't exactly west or east is basically uphill.
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This would depend on the mechanics of Fleshcrafting. If it changes DNA automatically, that would explain a lot. Otherwise, I agree that they probably wouldn't be able to do that. Still, since DNA wouldn't have much of an impact anyway after getting out of puberty it wouldn't matter that much anyway, except possibly for reproduction. You're right, messing with brain chemistry shouldn't be possible, even in real life our knowledge about that is limited. Still, is magic capable of altering a person's Cognitive aspect? Because that would create a viable replacement for mind manipulation. In that case I'll need to change Kuria's description in the planning doc a bit, since I initially gave them more power, at least when it comes to dealing with their own affairs. As for combat ability, I see mages more as an artillery type. If a swordsman gets close to mage, most of the less experienced once will probably lose. However, give them time to prepare, and a good supply of crystals, and they can do a lot of damage, basically like artillery in current day armies (they'd probably be used like that as well during wars).
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1. Sounds good. 2. I'm personally more concerned with how over the top it is, not how much it ignores physics. The issue is that even with things that are theoretically possible (like my own examples) you can do some ludicrous stuff that can destroy everything in a fifty light year radius. There are also a lot of things that we can do right now, and that just take a lot of time and resources, like turning a gas giant into a planet you can walk on, building star-sized supercomputers capable of simulating full galaxies, focusing the entire output of a star into a single beam, or launching almost unspotable relativistic projectiles on collision courses with planets that can wipe out all life on them.
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A conversation about the two types of Innate mages and what happens to those who have Innate magic that normally the other gender has, which then briefly went into the attitude Innate Ritualists might have of non-Innate Ritualists at the academy, which then went into weird hi-jinks that might happen there, which turned into the adventures of Harry Pothead, at which point we figured out the rather dark and messed up implications of mages who are basically college students having access to mind-altering magic. As for things to talk about, the Innate magic types might need some talk, but that's mostly just the opinions from people who aren't here at the moment. Other than that, maybe we could discuss laws regarding magic, how mages police themselves, and what these laws include? As for starting points: Which forms of magic are illegal? What is the attitude of the mages academy/council towards this? Are they competent in dealing with criminal mages, with specialized police mages, who might also help out normal law enforcement? Are they incompetent, with students generally cleaning up the mess? Or are they corrupt, only going after a few mages who happen to be rivals, and let most dangerous people just walk by, possibly just having them bribe them? What are the official and actual punishments for breaking various laws? How much does the public know about this?
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*Casts anti-gravity spell* Edit: Spells that alter someone's brain chemistry might be heavily restricted though, since you could do some really dark things that way.
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I think I said it before, but I expect gender reassignment spells to become the local version of experimenting in college. They'd probably also use magic to alter their brain chemistry to get high, or cultivate weed and shrooms in the greenhouses with magical plants (magic mushroom pun fully intended).
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... Now I'm wondering about the weird college hi-jinks mages would get up to.
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My personal take on it, if magic isn't perfectly divided across gender lines: The type of Innate magic a person has doesn't change if their physical gender changes, since it's part of their spiritweb, not their body. People who are trans, gender neutral or intersex will have their type of Innate magic decided at birth, but because this doesn't strictly follow gender lines both types of Innate magic will be possible, so nobody knows if they get the Innate magic fitting with their physical gender or mental gender, so anyone who creates a character or NPC who is not cisgender can decide for themselves.
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The thing is that using biological sex would create it's own problems, since it would (I think) be possible to use magic to switch gender, or in rare cases create a new one (I can even see this being the mages' version of having experimented in collage). You also have to consider intersex people (though this would probably just be a tossup, especially if Innate magic doesn't strictly follow gender lines).
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Dangerous in which way? Dangerous as in Australia turned up to eleven, or dangerous as in the entire ecosystem consists of carnivores? Seems interesting, but it would probably be good to still create some limits, and try to stick to known science (or technobabble) if possible. Some degree of rule of cool is fine to me, but I don't want it to get out of hand and starting an arms-race. Also, moderation would still be required when sticking to known (or theoretically possible) science, since having Thunderbolts (spatial manipulation type weapons) around, or having Von Neumann machines build matter energy converters in a star or planet to turn the whole thing into a bomb capable of making supernovas look puny, or other things of that nature, would probably not do the setting much good.
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I'm not really sure about this form of the natural side of Innate magic. It doesn't really seem that magical to me, more like a form of enhanced social skills. To me, it would make more sense if they could see more than just this, also seeing things like a person's health, or where magic concentrates, probably like seeing auras. These auras would allow you get an idea of a person's emotions and feelings, but they would also tell you additional things about them, like their health, or if they are Innates or people affected by Natural magic. They'd probably also be able to see where energy concentrates, such as spotting haunted locations, objects with a magical nature, Investure crystals, hot spots, etc. Seems interesting. That makes me wonder though, if we have a gender divide (even an incomplete one), how would this work with transgender people, or people who use magic to do gender reassignments?
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So I've come up with a character, as well as a piece of world-building regarding their origins. All this is fully open to discussion and change, since it involves additional world-building. The Flower Spirit's Forest and the Hidden Village: Lilia Blumenkind:
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Maybe a better analogy: two people are given the code for a computer program. One of them (the female Innate), is then given the program's user manual. The other one (the male Innate), is given the code's documentation. Both can see the actual code, but the female Innate knows what program the code will result in, but not how the algorithms function, while the male Innate knows what each of the functions and algorithms does, but actually needs manually analyze everything to figure out what the final program will be. True, though it would probably better to say that English was similar to Scandinavian languages, since a lot of the language was influenced by the Vikings who conquered the place. Still your point stands, and Icelandic would be better (just don't expect any grammar to be correct, since basically everyone will just use google translate).
