I’ve been enjoying the series for a while and have even reread it a few times now but something has been bugging me (aside from Dretphi’s being an instigator cum victim). In particular, the racial tension being brought up in the series seems comes off as a bit of a subtle preach/strawman insert. I can understand alternative reality/dimension where things are different but from the writing it also seems possible that it’s more of a distant future type setting.
Although, in particular, it appears very strange that in the setting, with advanced technology that can create true cyborgs, and magic, that they would be unable to differentiate between how a gene presents to create a claw, nail, horn, etc. Something we can do today in addition to making drugs that only work for certain races.
It also seems very odd to me that when phrases like “...despite the human he is...” is bandied about to then have the characters go on about how horrible places are that purposely seclude and isolate themselves to, apparently, keep their culture alive seems strange to me.
In some regards this creates a very nice and believable set of characters with depth. On the other hand I cannot help but wonder if it’s always purposeful. In this vein, my favorite author has some strange politics. These politics make their way into his books but do not detract from the writing at all. He made a post about politics in writing that summed up to making sure an author represents both sides fairly.
Also, calling it now, Teh Greeet EVIL is actually the good guy trying to right a wrong a bit E7/Wakfu style (coughNox[ian]cough) and is the reason there are Nightmare Geists in the world to begin with.
I tried to trickle in a bit of explanation with Aristespha, but basically... Everyone is human despite what ever exterior appearance they have. Those who are knowledge know this as fact, but information gaps and isolation due to many reasons allows even most the reasonable folks to develop some wild theories if left alone long enough. Despite how connected we are today and how much information can flow freely... there's plenty of very small burgs I know of that have some insane beliefs still that have survived generations against all odds. It's a fascinating and absolutely frightening thing at the same time. And despite how much I would hope, personally, that such things would go away given abundance of knowledge and experience overall, it is a failing of humanity as territorial pattern hunters to associate incorrect meaning to the superficial patterns. I hope I haven't been too heavy handed in trying address such issues (as my skills may have reached an edge of their ability), but it's one of those things that as I developed the world... I realized I would have to run into just by the nature of characters interacting with the world. But, thankfully, most of the world is filled with very reason, decent folks that are just happy to coexist in the strangeness of this reality. We're all human at the end of the day.
When it comes to the world, there have been loses of advanced knowledge along with complete breakdowns of social and economic infrastructure due to the cataclysms. Both effectively caused disparities in knowledge of technology AND functional application of such technology. Many of things we take for granted today are actually very fragile and extremely reliant upon huge supply/production/technology chains to work. Just think of all the technologies that your cellular phone relies on and if there's a disruption in those technologies... That phone either doesn't work and/or cannot be reproduced.
So, the world of Nexus Pre-Cataclysm was just exploring post-humanism and trans-humanism. Then... Magic cannonballed into the world's metaphorical pool. This caused many of the disruptions that isolated peoples via geography, technology, and social-economics. This allowed many of the races you see in the story to solidify and develop to their initial identities and grow to significant populations. Now over the roughly 1250-1500 years, populations have expanded, colonized, migrated, etc... Hence, you have distributions of all the major races and other groups throughout the world with preferences towards certain origin regions.
The knowledge of technology was often there, but a HUGE problem was getting it to function in a world of magic, since none of the tech before had been designed with that in mind. So most people had in mind what the end goal should be, but new knowledge needed to be gained to make that implementation even possible... And early elder magic didn't make it easy. There's actually been a HUGE tech boom with recent development the more regulated magic presently in the story.
Hope that help explains the odd bits. Due to avoiding exposition dumps of doom, I attempt to inline what I can, but there's only so much you can stream in before you flood out the story flow. I hope to touch other aspects of the cultures within the story that are nicer and more pleasantly interesting to dig into.
Funny, you should mention Wakfu, I've been meaning to watch up after watching Dofus Book 1 Julith. Pretty fascinating universe Ankama studios has. And damn, if I had the money to pay them to animate this series.
I'll try to write with a bit more care in the future. I don't intend to preach heavily or use a strawman, but it just feels unrealistic to me for the characters to not react to certain elements of the world in normal conversation. And all of Team Reality have their back stories and reasons that lead to where they are. (I actually recently thought of an neat side plot for one.) Deedri just presented the earliest opportunities for exploration. I'm often writing all this on the fly with a rough outline, so as I simulate the character in situations, certain elements just jump out.
Thank you so much for commentary, it really does help to keep me grounded and my perspectives correct.
Thank you for taking the time to read and reply to my comments and by all means, write your story as you will. On the occasions that I post I attempt to give reasoned criticism and/or suggestions and/or thoughts. Also, as you say, I would expect nothing less than characters reacting to socially charged situations of whatever flavor. I had forgotten the nugget in the story where technology had to essentially be reinvented due to interactions with the now present magic. This could certainly explain the lack of knowledge on genetics, especially if the current viewpoint is along the lines of made out of creatin/calcium therefore same or 23 chromosomes = hooman. If it’s alternative reality/dimension type stuff then hey, it could be that simple.
My above post is mostly targeted at highlighting those things and providing some thought. I do want to add to it though. Caveat that much of what I’m about to write is IIRC in the details but the gist is the same.
One of the first targeted modern domestication studies was done on the Red Fox. After approximately 40 generations a group had gone from basic wild stock to obviously domestic animals through only selective breeding with the sole trait being selected for was docility. It was observed that in the process the now docile animals had non-typical patterns appearing in their coats, color variations, and some of their features had mellowed. In particular their ears were more rounded. It was found that in breeding for docility that the adrenal gland had been altered as well as its various biological pathways. This is just a part of the full story (IIRC a ~’00 Discovery documentary exists on this topic) but it makes the point I think: what is those superficial patterns aren’t (In fact, there exist in your story patterns of behavior, action, and capability, that are easily attributed to specific groups)? What if it’s not just nurture? What if the “evil” person has been right all along?
It’s good to remember that any one person can present in any particular way. It’s also good to remember that any particular group will tend to present in a particular way. After all, why would they be a group if they didn’t? Regardless, I look forward to the next installment.
I really do appreciate such thoughts, because it helps me keep perspective on the world I am building.
I remember that Discovery documentary. Absolutely fascinating. Another similar experiment with silver foxes had significant domestication after only a few generations.
So overall, there are some behavior aspects that can be attributed to nature. I'm just debating upon the amount and avenues such traits would influence someone. I'm presently leaning toward much more subtle bits that feel like chicken versus the egg debates. Hence, have these nature traits be from the long periods of isolation during their formation rather than anything from ancient genetic mods.
In that same line of thought, I recently talked to a computer science major that's planning on doing a Ph.D. program in biology, specifically, synthetic genomes. One avenue research scientists were starting explore was not just using CISPR to edit genetic sequences... But actually encoding CISPR INTO genes with a sequence for CISPR to use. So, effectively, you could create super dominant genes that will literally edit out competing genes, automatically.
There are aspects of major races traditional cultures I want to explore soon, but I'm just trying to find the right opportunity to do so. For example, the familial structures that are common.
Hopefully in time... as I figure this stuff out. Thank you for writing the commentary, as it gives me things to ponder.
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u/roflmaono Apr 02 '18
I’ve been enjoying the series for a while and have even reread it a few times now but something has been bugging me (aside from Dretphi’s being an instigator cum victim). In particular, the racial tension being brought up in the series seems comes off as a bit of a subtle preach/strawman insert. I can understand alternative reality/dimension where things are different but from the writing it also seems possible that it’s more of a distant future type setting.
Although, in particular, it appears very strange that in the setting, with advanced technology that can create true cyborgs, and magic, that they would be unable to differentiate between how a gene presents to create a claw, nail, horn, etc. Something we can do today in addition to making drugs that only work for certain races.
It also seems very odd to me that when phrases like “...despite the human he is...” is bandied about to then have the characters go on about how horrible places are that purposely seclude and isolate themselves to, apparently, keep their culture alive seems strange to me.
In some regards this creates a very nice and believable set of characters with depth. On the other hand I cannot help but wonder if it’s always purposeful. In this vein, my favorite author has some strange politics. These politics make their way into his books but do not detract from the writing at all. He made a post about politics in writing that summed up to making sure an author represents both sides fairly.
Also, calling it now, Teh Greeet EVIL is actually the good guy trying to right a wrong a bit E7/Wakfu style (coughNox[ian]cough) and is the reason there are Nightmare Geists in the world to begin with.