The Campaign Builder's Guild

Have you ever considered slightly stranger creatures, like anthropomorphized crystal-folk, or energy beings, or sentient liquids?  I know you like races you can relate to and understand, but would it ruin the tone to throw in a couple of more alien creatures?  I mean of course it's up to you; it just seems to me that most of your races more or less boil down to a) humans or b) cosmetically altered humans, and one of the big draws of sci fi and fantasy for me is that of stretching the imagination, and trying to come up with creatures that think in a non-human way, with just enough commonalities that they aren't utterly opaque (of coruse, they could be utterly opaque, but then you're in Lovecraftian territory, and I know you don't tend to dip into those particular putrid waters).

Quote from: Steerpike'¦'¦'¦would it ruin the tone to throw in a couple of more alien creatures?'¦'¦'¦'¦'¦'¦'¦'¦'¦just seems to me that most of your races more or less boil down to a) humans or b) cosmetically altered humans, and one of the big draws of sci fi and fantasy for me is that of stretching the imagination, and trying to come up with creatures that think in a non-human way, with just enough commonalities that they aren't utterly opaque'¦'¦'¦'¦

Yeah, you know, there's something I've never understood about this whole "alien" thing:

What other thought process is there?

The way I see it human thought boils down this way:

must replicate self >>> must keep replication equipment functional until replication >>> must avoid/minimize damage to replication equipment, must fuel replication equipment and avoidance/mitigation equipment

I can think of ways to reduce the whole of human experience to this sequence.  I can think of ways to reduce the whole of any organism's experience to this sequence.  Only things that can defy this sequence would be a challenge, and logic then asks the question: if the sequence isn't in use then how would we know it's an organism?  By this criteria there is no such thing as an "alien" mind.

Now you may still want to deal with the fine details.  But the problem I have with that is I often have trouble understanding the fine details of humans.  If you can't understand your own species' fine details why would you believe that understanding the fine details of another species is going to depend on them being a different species.

In the end I'm just not sure I can come up with this "alien" you talk about.

You know, perhaps I can do something other than the sci-fi alternate world.  It seems a bit heavy an issue.  Not exactly my true style, either.  I'd much rather prefer something that expands the possibility for exploration.

Quote from: SilvercatMoonpawYou don't hold one spell at a time and then lose it in a casting.  You hold a spell and then wield it like a Swiss Army Knife with a certain selection of tools.  If you ever want to have a different tool selection you have to banish the spell you have and take in a new one.

That is freaking cooool.

Quote from: Sarisa

Quote from: SilvercatMoonpawYou don't hold one spell at a time and then lose it in a casting.  You hold a spell and then wield it like a Swiss Army Knife with a certain selection of tools.  If you ever want to have a different tool selection you have to banish the spell you have and take in a new one.

That is freaking cooool.

I'm glad you like it. :D

Like "magic is only found in items" and "the types of magic are based on environment" it's an attempt to give magic individual identities.  In too many RPGs I see magic is dumped out in this shapeshifting mass where mages are allowed to do basically anything and thus really just come off as a grand big mix of nothing.  (Mages in fiction seem to fall into the same trap.)

Agreed. Unless it is rare enough that you are awed by it's use in a literary context. (I.E. Gandalf was a bad ass because his magic was used rarely in front of a people that considered it a mysterious and strange thing.)
  I think your magic mechanic could facilitate that shock and awe that is difficult to achieve in games like D&D .
 (magic missile again?)

 Keep it up!

Quote from: Sarisa(I.E. Gandalf was a bad ass because his magic was used rarely in front of a people that considered it a mysterious and strange thing.)
I think your magic mechanic could facilitate that shock and awe that is difficult to achieve in games like D&D.

Unfortunately I think there may have been a misunderstanding here.

I don't want to make magic a strange thing.  I want to make magic a natural thing.  Natural like air and water and plants.  And natural things (normally) don't show the sort of shapeshifting variability that magic is portrayed as having.
I don't want people to be impressed by the existence of magic itself.  I want them to be impressed by skillful use, the ability to take something limited and push its limits.  It's unsatisfying to impress someone just because you have a gimmick.

[blockquote=Silvercat]I can think of ways to reduce the whole of human experience to this sequence. I can think of ways to reduce the whole of any organism's experience to this sequence. Only things that can defy this sequence would be a challenge, and logic then asks the question: if the sequence isn't in use then how would we know it's an organism? By this criteria there is no such thing as an "alien" mind.[/blockquote]Fair enough about the reproductive cycle - although have you ever heard of the hydra (not the mythological creature)?  It reproduces asexually through budding, admittedly (a passive process), but it is immune to senescence/aging because it can regress to an earlier stage in its life-cycle (a polyp).  Would immortality defeat, or at least, alter, the cycle you suggest is foundational?

Aren't there lots and lots of psychological/neurological differences between species, though, even given the basic reproduction cycle as a foundation??  I mean, different species think differently, even if they're of roughly equal intelligence; that's just a biological fact.  Cats and dogs are both remarkably intelilgent animals but they have radically different minds; I'm sure your anthropomorphic cat and dog people would think and act differently, right?

Quote from: SteerpikeFair enough about the reproductive cycle - although have you ever heard of the hydra (not the mythological creature)?  It reproduces asexually through budding, admittedly (a passive process), but it is immune to senescence/aging because it can regress to an earlier stage in its life-cycle (a polyp).  Would immortality defeat, or at least, alter, the cycle you suggest is foundational?

Not unless the creature was so stupid as to consider itself indestructable.  Because the important player isn't the replicator it's the thing being replicated.  One good hit and the replicator is dead, and so long as it hasn't done it's replicatory function the replicated thing has failed.  (This even applies when a sentient organism fails to produce genetic offspring: there is the urge to create something, and if you can't replicate your genetics you will very likely take up some activity that leaves a copy of your mentality.  That's my view of human civilization, anyway.)

Quote from: SteerpikeAren't there lots and lots of psychological/neurological differences between species, though, even given the basic reproduction cycle as a foundation??  I mean, different species think differently, even if they're of roughly equal intelligence; that's just a biological fact.  Cats and dogs are both remarkably intelilgent animals but they have radically different minds; I'm sure your anthropomorphic cat and dog people would think and act differently, right?

How do different species think differently?  I'm trying to see it, but every time I look at something to confirm it another fact comes in and suggests that the differences are only superficial.  Dogs will form group while cats will be loners?  Cats form group (not just lions, domestics can live together).  And will probably also have some sort of pecking order, though the first area I really seeing them diverge is that dogs will be strict about it while cats won't be (although even then I don't know how much different things will be).

I'm not sure where you're seeing such big differences.  I can see tiny little differences, just not enough to see the thought process as different from humans, or rather not enough to see the human thought process as being unique.  (I hope I'm not coming off as stubborn, I am trying to see what you're saying, I'm just not.)

I think we just see differences at different scales.  When I think of dogs versus cats for example, I think quite big differences despite lots of superficial similarities (both mammals, both furred, both quadrapedal, etc).  If I imagined that those creatrues evolved into creatures of humanoid intelilgence, I'd imagine that they'd act quite differently than humans do, or than each other do.  Cats, for example, I picture having a very individualistic culture in which social bonds are transient things and opportunism is unquestionably justified.  A cat would think, "If there are two choices, and one is clearly to my personal advantage, and one isn't, why would I choose the latter choice?  Why do humans insist on doing so with such frequency?  Bizarre creatures!"  Hedonism would rule, cats would revere no gods but themselves, and their language would have no words for "unconditional love."  Personal pleasure would be seen as worthwhile in and of itself, and the cat political structure would be ruthlessly Machiavellian, with an under-developed sense of empathy and compassion.  Subjugation of servant races in some cat cultures probably wouldn't be uncommon, but cats would make very poor servants so they likely wouldn't enslave their own kind.

In dog culture, I would imagine a formalized brutocracy, in which the strongest warrior, or the most authoritarian leader, is served unquestioningly until a usurper amasses enough power to take his place (and it probably would be a patriarchy).  Family bonds and ties, and social bonds, would be sacrosanct and unbreakable things.  Oaths would be of incredible importance, and discipline of certain varieties would be central to the culture (unlike cats, who would suffer from a remarkable lack of self-discipline, though they mightbe fastidious).  Feasts and communal dispays of communal bonding would be common, customs alien to the cats with their hyper-developed sense of personal space and privacy (dogs would have far fewer taboos and manners around such niceties).  Weakness would generally be despised, but faith and piety, possibly to unseen, nebulous, but deified all-mother/father/creator/master figures, would be rewarded.  Personal contact and touch would be casual and common, unlike cat-culture where touching without permission would be disrespectful.

A dog would think, "If there are two choices, one serving only myself and the other with benefits for my pack/clan/state, I am obliged to choose the latter, or else be seen as a traitor and coward, and incrue dishonor.  Look at the humans: little better than cats!  They abandon such niceties at a moment's notice."  A strong dog might also think, "The leader, who is supreme and must be served unquestionably, is weak and sick.  He is no longer the ideal leader of the community.  I am stronger than he is, and will lead better.  I owe it to him and to my pack/clan/state to depose him."  This would probably be ritualized.

So anthropomorphized cats in my mind would probably come off as selfish, sociopathic, pleasure-loving dandies with a biological inability to empathize (much like Luminous Crayon's elves) with ruthless, calculating brains and boundless appetites for personal pleasure, for whom narcissism is the closest thing they've ever had to religion.  Dogs would be militaristic authoritarians with unquestioning subservience to a power-based hierarchy and the laws of strength, power, and will - glorified thugs who like to cuddle.  Both have a lot of similarities to human psychologies - indeed, cats would consider humans rather dog-like, whereas dogs would consider humans rather cat-like - but ultimately both emphasize certain aspects of existence more than humans do, while de-emphasizing others.

I personally find cats a lot stranger/ more "alien" than dogs so I think my version of them comes off as stranger than my version of dogs.  Both, of course, rely on your reproductive/self-replicating foundation and still share a lot in common with humans, while still (hopefully) coming off as different creatures than humans (or at least, very different creatures than each other?), thinking from different perspectives and retaining radically different value systems.

Of course, I have a fondness for the dystopian (no secret), so my versions of cats and dogs are probably pretty dark.  But that's more of my "spin" on them.

My point earlier was about creatrues or entities with even more differences from us than cats and dogs.  Like ants (hive mind).  Or a sentient pond.

Hopefully that explains better what I mean when I refer to "weird" or "alien" races.

Quote from: SteerpikeHopefully that explains better what I mean when I refer to "weird" or "alien" races.

I think it does.  But I think it also illustrates how differently we see this.

You made complicated cultures out of you views of cats and dogs, taking a lot of details from each.  However in my version I'd start out with the assumption that the creatures I'm using as bases are mostly learned behavior and that fundamentally they're the same.  When I change them into new kinds of creatures I don't drag along their learned stuff and instead assume they pick up new behaviors.  So they're not going to turn out much different from humans simply because their behavior's going to develop in very similar conditions.

So really where we're diverging is that your focusing very highly and exaggerating differences that I see as unimportant to the true picture.  You're right, it's scale.  I think the only way I could try it is if I was shown humans using the same scale lense: "adaptable and varied" does not a good example make.

So really, it becomes a question of evolutionary biology and sociology.  Does high intelligence necessitate a typically familial-based, primate-esque social structure and psychology, such that any sufficiently intelligent creature arrives at something resembling the human consciousness (even with other physical differences), or does a creature's psychology extrapolate from its roots, potentially creating a more diverse array of intelligences that can be compared in terms of raw intellectual capability and the capacity for complex thought, while still remaining qualitatively different?  You tend to the former, I the latter view; there's still the big question of scale (the cats and dogs I described still aren't that different than humans) but the preexisting distinction is there.

Not an easy question to answer, though a fascinating one.

Quote from: SteerpikeNot an easy question to answer, though a fascinating one.

And probably not something I'm going to want to try addressing.  I have enough troubles just coming up with races I like, critically analyzing them is too much brain-strain for me.

Another pretty good notion has crossed my mind:

"Now, bring me that horizon." '" Jack Sparrow, Pirates of the Caribbean I

Mythic tales of adventure and swashbuckling, that's what I seem to be attracted to right now.  Tales of sailing off and finding islands full of oddities and having to fight evil monsters or demon-sorcerers combined with swinging from the rigging and hoards of treasure.  I still can't decide what tech level I want there to be, as some aspects of modern tech are fine but there's a certain feeling of limitation I like.  Possibly I could use technology from 20th century, as I seem to do fine with portrayals of the 30s, 40s, 80s, and 90s.

So what I've got is Arabian Nights starring pirates using 20th century technology.  So what I need are a large stretch of islands with regions unexplored and filled with strange stuff and some trade routes to attack for plunder.  Possibly I need some way to justify the technology.

I think early twentieth century could rock.  Steamboats and sixguns for the win.