Aether Sea Chronicle: A Science-Fantasy

[Logos&Eidos]

Since my old world-building thread"Life on the Worldtree." Has run it's cource...it's time to make a new one!

This will be developer's diary of sorts as I work out the kinks of my world and all it's aspect. Magic,military,social structure ,ecology and anything that comes to mind;I'd prefer not to make a different thread for everything.
Feedback is appreciated.:biggrin:

With the basic concepts for the world and it's climate solved. I've more or less moved on to the people,society history and ecology.

The natives to the world-tree have had a few dozen centuries worth of bad luck. Three civilization ending cataclysms in relatively close succession. A planner conjunction that let eldritch beings,only some of which count as abominations though, into the physical plane which they preceded to overrun as foreign invasive species are want to do. Then after the "demons" were exterminated, their half-demon children enslaved the planet feeling more loyalty and identification with extra-planner half of their ancestry. Finally after the half-demons were wiped out. The quasi-magocracy that had been established after the half-demon war...self destructed. A psychic plague sweat through that region of the cosmos which have had the effect of amplifying emotions particularity the negatives ones while at the same time lowering self-control.

Two thousand years after that society has reverted back in many ways to what it had been before the planner conjunction. So Let's work out what the world-tree's civilizations were like.

 

[Logos&Eidos]

I am struggling between two possible and predominant arrangements of civilization. The common grand region spanning empires. or confederacies of independent city-states that while sometimes fighting among themselves will band together against outside threats; perhaps best compared to Hellenic city-state era.

I can sees the reason for both happening, the empires are rather obvious somebody would eventually try to bring everyone and their resources under the control of a single power.

I am leaning more towards the city-state confederation model. It makes a lot of since following the chain of logic. The world's apocalyptic weather forces civilization underground since any permanent surface settlement would just get destroyed. The rigors of living in the underground, would make people very stubborn and independent and self-reliant;especially since cave ins would mean that you could be cut off from your neighbors/ trading-partners. As do nesting monsters.

The most likely reasons for conflict are living and farming space, since it's easier to reinforce an existing cave than dig an entirely new one. Resource being a second. Since running out of space isn't going to happen that often war is likely infrequent. I kinda see resource wars being more based on raiding than occupation. take what your enemy has and go home to your giant cave. rather than stay and make their cave yours.

I really just don't see an "underdark" being conducive to conventional warfare and occupation.

So just how plausible is my set up, are there any thing that I failed to account for? Or need to be expand upon.

 

[Logos&Eidos]

There are seven race who inhabited this world.

Dragon-folk ( humanoids with draconic features,leathery skin,clawed hands and feet)

Elves (more the elfin people of jack&daxter than traditional fantasy elves)

Dwarfs ( just short broadly built elves)

Dwelves( the closet things this world has to "humans" are elf dwarf cross breeds)

Bird-folk

Mer-folk

Insect/crustacean folk(who are the only race truly adapted to the climate shifts).

In terms of sapient races I really don't want to break the mold, no hyper exotic nigh incomprehensible cultures .My goal is to fuse space opera and epic fantasy not right a xeno-cultural drama; the Foreigner series is already doing that better than I could or intend to.

However if your doing what everybody else is already doing then how do you stand out? In this world following the chain of logic I came to realizes that Sign-language and picto and ideao graphic righting systems would have a great deal of Importance. Half the world-tree's races, the bird-folk , the insect-folk,the mer-folk all have difrant vocal structures than the more human like races. Though with effort and training the Bird and insect folk can learn to duplicate more human sounds it doesn't feel natural for them and it's doesn't sound natural to hear. The mer-folk have to voices, one for the surface and a deep/true speech for beneath the water,which is ultra-sonic and sounds horrible and barely understandable on the surface.

A common means of communication between these races, would have had be something that they could all understand and use regardless of anatomy and location. A type of sign language as the medium trade and diplomacy. And a written language based around objects and ideas instead of of phonemes made the most since to me.

 

[chrispenycate]

But sign language requires a similar physiology; you couldn't devise a set of sophisticated symbols that match multiple species; imagine signing with a dolphin. But you can read a dog's body language with experience. So I suggest there will be a separate trade talk for each pair of species. OK, the majority of your races are humanoid, and have enough similarities with each other to manage some common sign, but communication between them will always be very approximate; the concepts they are attempting to transfer are very different, their minds work in fundamentally different ways.

Which means that a multirace meeting is worse than a medical conference in the WHO in Gerneva; some of the less sociable races are going through three or four levels of translation. And, as well as the semaphore () there are various noises from races whose vocal apparatuses are capable of duplicating each other's sounds close enough to be understandable, plus conversation within groups, the sound of chalk on slates, with sketches, diagrams and universal symbols worked out over generations going down, and being wiped clean for the next concept… I suspect I could feel quite at home.

 

[Logos&Eidos]

But sign language requires a similar physiology; you couldn't devise a set of sophisticated symbols that match multiple species; imagine signing with a dolphin. But you can read a dog's body language with experience. So I suggest there will be a separate trade talk for each pair of species. OK, the majority of your races are humanoid, and have enough similarities with each other to manage some common sign, but communication between them will always be very approximate; the concepts they are attempting to transfer are very different, their minds work in fundamentally different ways.

Which means that a multirace meeting is worse than a medical conference in the WHO in Gerneva; some of the less sociable races are going through three or four levels of translation. And, as well as the semaphore () there are various noises from races whose vocal apparatuses are capable of duplicating each other's sounds close enough to be understandable, plus conversation within groups, the sound of chalk on slates, with sketches, diagrams and universal symbols worked out over generations going down, and being wiped clean for the next concept… I suspect I could feel quite at home.

At last feedback! Difficulties in communication is another reason to justify the varios races staying out of one anotheres way.
One of the reasons that I placed a global empire in the world's immediate past is that Lost more advanced civilizations are cool. And as a follower of steven brust theory of cool That is very important to me. Having everyone in the modern being descened frrom the same culture also solved alot of world-building issues for me.

 

[Logos&Eidos]

But sign language requires a similar physiology; you couldn't devise a set of sophisticated symbols that match multiple species; imagine signing with a dolphin. But you can read a dog's body language with experience. So I suggest there will be a separate trade talk for each pair of species. OK, the majority of your races are humanoid, and have enough similarities with each other to manage some common sign, but communication between them will always be very approximate; the concepts they are attempting to transfer are very different, their minds work in fundamentally different ways.

Which means that a multirace meeting is worse than a medical conference in the WHO in Gerneva; some of the less sociable races are going through three or four levels of translation. And, as well as the semaphore () there are various noises from races whose vocal apparatuses are capable of duplicating each other's sounds close enough to be understandable, plus conversation within groups, the sound of chalk on slates, with sketches, diagrams and universal symbols worked out over generations going down, and being wiped clean for the next concept… I suspect I could feel quite at home.

At last feedback! Difficulties in communication is another reason to justify the varios races staying out of one each others way and not cohabitating that much.


One of the reasons that I placed a global empire in the world's immediate past is that Lost more advanced civilizations are cool. And as a follower of steven brust theory of cool That is very important to me. Also having everyone in the modern day being descened frrom the same culture also solved alot of world-building issues for me.




Which means that a multirace meeting is worse than a medical conference in the WHO in Gerneva; some of the less sociable races are going through three or four levels of translation. And, as well as the semaphore () there are various noises from races whose vocal apparatuses are capable of duplicating each other's sounds close enough to be understandable, plus conversation within groups, the sound of chalk on slates, with sketches, diagrams and universal symbols worked out over generations going down, and being wiped clean for the next concept… I suspect I could feel quite at home.[/QUOTE]

At last feedback! Difficulties in communication is another reason to justify the various races staying out of one each others way and not cohabitation that much.


One of the reasons that I placed a global empire in the world's immediate past is that Lost more advanced civilizations are cool. And as a follower of steven brust theory of cool That is very important to me. Also having everyone in the modern day being descended from the same culture also solved a lot of world-building issues for me.



Next subject.

Finding the place of magic in this world was an interesting process, i started with the realization that with few exceptions magic users aren't truly integrated into the worlds or societies in which they inhabit. Even in the settings where mage guilds exist the magic users are still on the fringes of society.

The examples of integrated magic users that I had seen, The Jedi Order, The Aes sedai,The Shujenga Legend Of The Five Ring. All fell into the same bracket of the noble(in the Case of the Shujenga literally) guardian and civil servant.

That bracket however not only didn't really suit me, it didn't fit with current state of the world;disorder and regression. I lookled at another piece of media a manga called Naruto. The Hidden Villages that Ninja come from as well as the Ninja themselves. Provived a more suitible bascis for the mages of my world. They are mercenery Kabals/syndicates that sell their services to the highest bidder and give preffed client status to their host nation.

On the world tree and the rest of the aether filled cosmos, magic is a powerfull and reliable force with an acceaptle level of negatives. It is herditairy much the same the way that talent is in the real world; running in certain famielies but possibly manifesting anyware. That sort of power would logically give mages a lot of political and ecomionic power...doubly so because their abilities for most of the peoples history had been indespinsible for survival. However I didn't want society to be magocratic by deafult.

Despite their power society not being ruled(overtly) by mages didn't seem illogical to me. Physical power has been a deciceding factor in the survival of humanity, and yet we've experimented with many difrent kinds of socities. There are also some very plausible reasons for not wanting to"where the crown", namely when your in charge everything is your fault.


Finding the place of magic in this world was an interesting process, I started with the realization that with few exceptions magic users aren't truly integrated into the worlds or societies in which they inhabit. Even in the settings where mage guilds exist the magic users are still on the fringes of society.

The examples of integrated magic users that I had seen, The Jedi Order, The Aes sedai,The Shujenga Legend Of The Five Ring. All fell into the same bracket of the noble(in the Case of the Shujenga literally) guardian and civil servant.

That bracket however not only didn't really suit me, it didn't fit with current state of the world;disorder and regression. I looked at another piece of media a manga called Naruto. The Hidden Villages that Ninja come from as well as the Ninja themselves. Provided a more suitable basis for the mages of my world. They are mercenary Cabals/syndicates that sell their services to the highest bidder and give preferred client status to their host nation.

On the world tree and the rest of the aether filled cosmos, magic is a powerful and reliable force with an acceptable level of negatives. It is hereditary much the same the way that talent is in the real world; running in certain families but possibly manifesting anywhere. That sort of power would logically give mages a lot of political and economic power...doubly So because their abilities for most of the peoples history had been indispensable for survival. However I didn't want society to be magocratic by default.

Despite their power society not being ruled(overtly) by mages didn't seem illogical to me. Physical power has been a deciding factor in the survival of humanity, and yet we've experimented with many different kinds of societies. There are also some very plausible reasons for not wanting to"wear the crown", namely when your in charge everything is your fault.

 

[Logos&Eidos]

To spare myself some serious headaches I had rip out my main magic system and completely replace it. My original magic system was based around the rather common concept of shaping mystical energy to do what you want;in my case that energy was the chaos that saturated the cosmos. The problem was that without slapping on "game-balance" style limitations the system was just to powerful and unwieldy. There were other issues as well, relating to the relationship between magic and technology in the verse.

The new magic was based around "connection" lines of pure dynamism that link everything together. it was far easier to manage, having almost none of the previous systems problems . Though it did make magic closer to psionics than i had originally intended and the the Force. It is more inline with some of my earlier ideas about the mechanics of magic.

 

[Logos&Eidos]

Unfortunately I find myself having to "cut" yet another idea, good by world-trees I really liked you. But keeping them as they were, the home of civilization, was just to much of a headache.

The "new" home of the civilization, is a lot more conventional,but still just a about exotic. A liquid giant planet nearly the sizes of a star orbited by hundreds of moons at various distances. Giving us,inner,middle and outer worlds.

Another problem I had was the scale of the setting, love grand galaxy crossing space opera. however setting a story on that scale just became to unwieldy. And necessitated a much higher tech-level than I really want to deal with at the present time.

I am still keeping the Hyperdrive, albeit a version of the drive much to weak and inefficient for inter stellar travel; but fast enough to put about the system with out having to spend a century moving from the outer to the inner planets.