Mana levels, WTF? Options

[JTNLANGE]

I was wondering about the mana levels. If you take what canon says then each world last about 7500 years, with the peak being about 3500 years in. that means that as the magic level rises and magic becaomes more powerful we get new "things" happening, like shedim and insect spirits and SURGE. if all this stuff is happening now and we are only a few years in what could possible be in store. Now I now that the mana level is along way from hitting peak and that at the rate that game is progressing there is no way we would ever hit that, but it is kinda cool to think about. Also is the metacampaign tied into the rise of mana?


Trevor

[TinkerGnome]

Horrors. They are what will show up at the peak.

Shedim aren't really a function of the mana level, I don't think. They were just trapped somewhere... else.

[Garland]

The mana level is actually rising way faster than it should. Supposedly it was "jump-started" by the Great Ghost Dance. Instead of a gradual building of mana we get disasters like Goblinization, SURGE, nuclear meltdowns, volcanic eruptions, etc.

This, of course, implies that certain people/organizations want the mana level elevated faster. Make of that what you will.

[Ancient History]

The mana level appears to be rising normally, now. The Great Ghost Dance created a "Spike" which would have let them in thousands of years earlier at the exact location of the dance; but it has since been levelled off to more-or-less normal.

As the mana level rises, other planes gain access to the normal one and more stuff appears. THe Shedim may be a fluke caused by the unusual circumstances of Dunkelzahn's death and Ghostwalker's return.

The Horrors have a "window" of opportunity to come through and maintain themselves that's approx. 800 years long; the most powerful require even higher windows and thus have much shorter periods where they can maintain themselves fully ont he physical plane (although they can maintain themselves on the astral plane for a greater period before and afterwards).

Some Horrors only need a certain mana level to enter, not to remain.

[JTNLANGE]

Yeah that makes sense. Hadn't thought about that. Who would want the mana level to rise faster though. My bet would be the elves. or the dragons maybe. Wasn't it one of the elves who taught Daniel Howling Coyote the GDD. And why is having the mana level rising faster a good thing? I would think that having the horrors back is bad right? I mean didn't Harlequin go to all that trouble not to mention the big D just to make sure that the horrors wouldn't come back any sooner then they had to.


Trevor

[Nikoli]

The Dragons and the IE's typically don't want these things to return. But who'se to saythere isn't a harbinger of sorts working to speed things along?

Some sort of very low power horror that needs only the mana levels prior to 2011 to maintain a presence. Or maybe it appeared to a willing subject, and is duping them into these actions.

[Nath]

[TinkerGnome]

Who taught the GDD is a mystery. I've heard rumors that it was a certain dwarf with a questionable lineage who has been around a very long time.

One of the theories I initially heard (a very, very long time ago) was that the mana level is tied, somehow, to the amount of life on the planet. I've since come to reconsider that one because of VITAS and the like. Death like that should have slowed the mana growth a bit.

The theory went that the horrors came in when it hit a peak and then killed and rampaged life until there was so little left that they were forced back to their home dimensions. The caers in earthdawn stunted the process because so many metahumans survived the Scourge and left the world stuck in a half-peak state for a while.

[shadd4d]

But what about someone who wants their full power. If you thin about it, imagine drinking in a child's cup (yes, the one for babies). If you or I know we can chug 1,5 liters of Diet Coke in 1 gulp, but we can't do that with a baby's glass. Hence wanting to increase the levels of mana in order to be able to have access to more.

What about another thought? What if (big assumption here) protection against the horrors also requires a certain level of magic? If that were true, then some might want to speed up the process so they can "secure their personal bomb shelters."

What about the born drakes, Icewing's pet project? If they only emerge during SURGE and such levels, then the dragons might want to have their, in their eyes, only trustworthy and competent servants at their beck and call.

I guess this view is: if magic has brought something good, more of it will bring more goodness. I can see quite a few people taking that view, even if they knew better.

Don

[Nikoli]

Speaking of ED, where are the rock people in SR? almost evey other playable race is in SR, why not show some love to the rocks?

[Siege]

Or the t'skrang.

Seriously though, there are various speculations -- the toxic levels somehow killed the rocks, they didn't survive the downtime, the mana levels aren't high enough, etc.

I think ultimately the designers were trying not to import the entire ED line directly into a futuristic setting and leave some things open for possible development later.

-Siege

[Garland]

I have this theory that races manifest at least partially based on the beliefs that metahumanity holds. An example would be cyclopes-trolls showing up in Greece. When the mana level is high enough, it acts on that sort of cultural belief.

This would explain why the Atlantean Foundation is introducing "Lizardmen" and "Earth Elementals" as player-character races in the Dawn of Atlantis online game (see Target: Matrix). It's an attempt to re-acquaint the population's unconscious with these races.

Of course, this is just my theory. One could easily turn the whole thing around and say it's not belief but memory; cyclopes only show up in Greece and that's just the way it is, and that's why the culture there includes myths of cyclopes.

Edit: As a side note, I'm a much bigger fan of the t'skrang than the obsidimen. The t'skrang are about the best-realized race of lizardmen I've ever seen in an RPG. But then again, I've got a weakness for swashbuckling.

This post has been edited by Garland: Jun 15 2004, 03:27 PM

[TinkerGnome]

Obsidimen might be gone forever unless something changed to the whole Liferock dynamic. No clue, though, since I never played one in ED and can't remember how important the rocks were to their survival.

[Ancient History]

Small Notes:

Cyclops appear in ED too (admittedly, in LRG's timeline).

There's a possible report of t'skrang in Corporate Download; it was mentioned that Scale was seen in a lizard-man form. Of course, that may just be a function of his age.

Obsidimen are weird...sort of fragmented spirits in bodies made from flesh and elemental earth. The closest approximation I could give is when Zebulon broke up into sub-spirits; with each sub spirit being a distinct spirit that was yet conencted to the others. Even that example is incorrect or insufficient in many respects.

NMath: You should know better than to spread bad rumors! :P

[Garland]

Not just cyclops, but ghoul-cyclops! :spin:

[BitBasher]

It was officially stated in an interview at a convention some years ago that those races that had not yet appeared were dead forever.

[Siege]

[BitBasher]

[MrSandman666]

What about local mana peaks? could it be possible for a horror to enter the sixth world through a local mana spike of some sort and live there for as long as the peak exists? He would probably be bound to the area of the peak but would it be possible?

[TinkerGnome]

It depends on the horror.

[Garland]

If you're the GM, sure it's possible. There are plenty of precendents of "localized magical anomalies."

[Dax]

[LaughingTiger]

The Horrors themselves are very vague in defintion. There's no taxonomy, no form or reason to them. They're horrors, the smallers inflict physical pain and destruction, the larger ones feed on emotional pain and anguish. They vary from ungodly thing to ungodly thing.

What we do know:

1. Horrors live in a "part" of the Astral plane, something called the "Netherrealms".
2. Magid needs to be a certain level for some of them to appear here, and that ammount varies from Horror to Horror.
3. Some of them have long term plans that could potentially survive from Scourge to Scourge, the "scourge" being the time when Horrors walk the earth and those no protected die horrible, horrible deaths.

So if you wanted to incorporate a horror into your game, there's plenty of room for you to do so. I think, conversly, the more powerful horrors can manufacture their own level of mana/magical activity and "cross over" before it's supposed to happen, especially now since the 6th world is kinda messed up. Even the pros, the Dragons and IE's, are at a loss to explain somethings. And there's so much they don't want us to know.

What's in store? A gradual increase in magic, till a large portion of the population can innately work magic to some degree. It doesn't translate well into SR rules, but heroes and people in EarthDawn are a form of adept. Then a world-ending catastrophe, wars, volcanoes, earthquakes, the construction of kaers, a time of hiding, and then we start all over again. That is, if the 6th world takes the same route as the 3rd, or 4th.

Really, it's all up in the air.

And there will always, always be T'skrang, somewhere, in some lonely river.

Anybody ever think about using Obsidimen for a horror-atmosphere game? Sent to investigate a mining camp that everyone has lost contact with, after they reportedly struck some unknown type of mineral vien, concentrated in one large clump? Maddened, toxic-corrupted Obsidimen on the rampage...

[Nikoli]

Or someone summons up an earth elemental, who just happens to not go away and doesn't blindly obey anymore...

[JTNLANGE]

Having never played ED, at what point in the 4th world does the game happen. Could there be a worse thing than horrors out there that we don't know about. If the end of the magic cycle has things not being able to survive because the mana level is to low maybe at the peak of the cycle there is a world altering "thing" that can survive. Wouldn't be a very long time in the grand scheme maybe just a few years but the culmination of all the mana could bring on a world altering event that prepares the world for the next cycle? Any thoughts.

Also what could the next round of changes be? We had goblinization,SURGE, Magic-users and new breeds of animals, What could be next?


Trevor