A Whole New World

[Shadowsoul]

Re: A Whole New World

 

IMHO the best way to make the 'bad-guys' original is to try a different approach to 'evil'. Don't have them as simple marauders or beings that are malevolent for the sake of it.

 

Perhaps they believe that their underworld is the true world and that the world above is the land of ghosts or illusions. They venture onto the surface world in search of certain resources and have no respect for the beings they encounter. Killing a ghost is no crime after all. And torturing one for information is no problem either, the creature may appear to be suffering but that is just an illusion created by too much exposure to the surface world. Their religion teaches that the surface world is the world of deceit and therefore a kind of hell, if you begin to believe in the surface world then your soul will become trapped there and you will cease to exist in any real sense. So, these creatures avoid feeling any sentiment towards the 'ghosts' and slaughter them without mercy if they begin to feel any sympathy for them. They will even kill those who begin to question this belief to save them from becoming 'damned'. Whether this religion is simply misguided or whether it is a conscious lie fabricated by this race's leaders is up to you.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

Hmm... flat world, pylons disappearing into the sky... the logical conclusion (from a mythic cosmological perspective) is that the pylons actually support the sky. This would lend itself to an almost Ptolemaic model of the universe, with the flat world at the center and the sun, moon, stars and planets on "crystal spheres" or some other type of conveying framework. This of course begs the question of what lies outside this framework.

 

Whoa, wait a second. I just got hit with the most bizarre vision. The pylons are actually the stacks of enormous furnaces and steam engines beneath the surface of the earth, which power the machinery that keep the heavens turning. What belches out of the stacks forms the clouds. The sun is an enormous ball filled with combustibles, which emerges out of the top of one pylon, tracks across the sky as it burns its "fuel," then passes into another pylon on the opposite side of the world, from where it's carried beneath the earth overnight to its starting position and refueled for the next day's run. If there's anyone living on the "bottom" of the world, they never see the sun at all.

 

I need to think more about the implications of this.

 

And BTW, Boric, welcome back to HERO and to our community! I hope you derive much enjoyment from both. (Might be a worthy occasion to consider emancipating those slaves.)

 

First off, thanks for the input and the welcome.

 

The pylons don't "hold up" the sky they seem to be holding up the world. A dweller ont he surface of the world would see the land, sea, and heavens much the way we do. He wouldn't there were pylons unless he went "below"

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

with the afterlife on the other side?

No but maybe a land of the undead past the river and just before one would fall off the edge of the world.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

That doesn't suggest a story. The sun disappearing into the pylons suggests a story at some point and something different about the world.

 

Right now I am thinking that this world sounds like a 64 pin computer chip....

 

Hmmm. Now there's a thought. 64 pylons hold up the World.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

IMHO the best way to make the 'bad-guys' original is to try a different approach to 'evil'. Don't have them as simple marauders or beings that are malevolent for the sake of it.

 

Perhaps they believe that their underworld is the true world and that the world above is the land of ghosts or illusions. They venture onto the surface world in search of certain resources and have no respect for the beings they encounter. Killing a ghost is no crime after all. And torturing one for information is no problem either, the creature may appear to be suffering but that is just an illusion created by too much exposure to the surface world. Their religion teaches that the surface world is the world of deceit and therefore a kind of hell, if you begin to believe in the surface world then your soul will become trapped there and you will cease to exist in any real sense. So, these creatures avoid feeling any sentiment towards the 'ghosts' and slaughter them without mercy if they begin to feel any sympathy for them. They will even kill those who begin to question this belief to save them from becoming 'damned'. Whether this religion is simply misguided or whether it is a conscious lie fabricated by this race's leaders is up to you.

 

I like! Maybe they're actually "good looking" as opposed to looking like the usual monstrous races.

[Markdoc]

Re: A Whole New World

 

In terms of bad guys, have a look at the Demons from the novel "The Shattered World" (which, by the way, would make a great fantasy setting!). They live "under" the inhabited world and while in same ways are stereotypical demons are also interestingly fleshed out.

 

cheers, Mark

[RexMundi]

Re: A Whole New World

 

Shattered World was one of the things I was going to mention, heh. Mighty fine read that.

 

~Rex

[Lord Liaden]

Re: A Whole New World

 

First off, thanks for the input and the welcome.

 

The pylons don't "hold up" the sky they seem to be holding up the world. A dweller ont he surface of the world would see the land, sea, and heavens much the way we do. He wouldn't there were pylons unless he went "below"

 

Ah, my apologies for misreading your description.

 

The mythology of India has the Earth supported on the back of an enormous elephant, riding on top of an even bigger turtle, swimming in an infinite sea. Perhaps the pylons are holding this world above such a sea. The reason the sun "disappears" into them is because it's quenched like a flame when it reaches the surface of the water. That's also why the pylons appear to vanish into nothingness -- there's no light to reveal the surface of the sea.

 

The pylons are hollow, drawing water up to the land like pipes. The ones around the rim of the world have created an immense "river" surrounding it, like the River Oceanus in Greek mythology. Inland the pylons are beneath the seas and major lakes of the world. All the running water on this world eventually makes its way back to the girdling river, where it falls off the edge of the world into the sea below.

 

Perhaps the pylons are organic like trees or stalks of bamboo, and have immense "leaves" or "branches" upon which other beings dwell, like multiple versions of the World Tree from Norse legend. They may even be "roots" growing out of the bottom of the world, which is why they draw water up from the infinite sea. Other smaller roots could be tangled between and among the larger pylons, forming a "web" among which things dwell -- think of how the network of a plant's roots looks when you uproot it from its soil.

 

In fact, that could be how the gods formed this world... they pulled it up from the bottom of the sea, so man would have dry land to dwell on. The inhabitants of the underside of the world could be the equivalent of grubs and aphids, while the sea teams with creatures small or vast. Some of those sea creatures sometimes make their way up the pylons to the waters on the surface, drawn to the light and warmth of the sun.

 

Whew! Sorry, I don't mean to keep rambling like this.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

Ah, my apologies for misreading your description.

 

The mythology of India has the Earth supported on the back of an enormous elephant, riding on top of an even bigger turtle, swimming in an infinite sea. Perhaps the pylons are holding this world above such a sea. The reason the sun "disappears" into them is because it's quenched like a flame when it reaches the surface of the water. That's also why the pylons appear to vanish into nothingness -- there's no light to reveal the surface of the sea.

 

The pylons are hollow, drawing water up to the land like pipes. The ones around the rim of the world have created an immense "river" surrounding it, like the River Oceanus in Greek mythology. Inland the pylons are beneath the seas and major lakes of the world. All the running water on this world eventually makes its way back to the girdling river, where it falls off the edge of the world into the sea below.

 

Perhaps the pylons are organic like trees or stalks of bamboo, and have immense "leaves" or "branches" upon which other beings dwell, like multiple versions of the World Tree from Norse legend. They may even be "roots" growing out of the bottom of the world, which is why they draw water up from the infinite sea. Other smaller roots could be tangled between and among the larger pylons, forming a "web" among which things dwell -- think of how the network of a plant's roots looks when you uproot it from its soil.

 

In fact, that could be how the gods formed this world... they pulled it up from the bottom of the sea, so man would have dry land to dwell on. The inhabitants of the underside of the world could be the equivalent of grubs and aphids, while the sea teams with creatures small or vast. Some of those sea creatures sometimes make their way up the pylons to the waters on the surface, drawn to the light and warmth of the sun.

 

Whew! Sorry, I don't mean to keep rambling like this.

 

I actually like the concept and the idea of immense sea sounds cool. However I do prefer the pylons be made of some inorganic matter that is mysterious in it's makeup being neither organic or innert. Cool ideas though

[Lord Liaden]

Re: A Whole New World

 

If the pylons are tapered toward the top rather than straight up-and-down, they could be built like a ziggurat, in ever-smaller flat sections with exposed "steps" around each level. Sapient beings could build their homes on these steps, and convert some of them into agricultural terrace-farms covered with soil from the world above. Since this "underworld" is sunless, the crops they grow would likely have to be some form of fungus rather than green plants, such as are cultivated below ground by some varieties of ants. Heck, they could even be ant-like. Or perhaps mammalian, but resembling real-world species adapted to life in the darkness, like moles. There could also be owl-men or bat-men flying between the pylons.

 

Some of these races may have colonized the world above, perhaps producing offshoots better adapted to life beneath the sun. OTOH the descendants of humans could also have found their way down to the pylons, evolving into Morlock-like albinos.

 

The dark, infinite sea may be the home of monstrous aquatic races or gods opposed to the deities who created the world. Just imagine some of the nightmarish-looking things dwelling in the deepest parts of our world's oceans, given intelligence and manipulatory limbs. As enemies, their most logical ultimate goal would be to destroy the sun permanently, allowing them to overrrun the world above. Those who make their way up the pylons into the surface seas and lakes might, rather like H.P. Lovecraft's "Deep Ones," seek to mate with humans to produce hybrid offspring who can function freely on land during the day.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

If the pylons are tapered toward the top rather than straight up-and-down' date=' they could be built like a ziggurat, in ever-smaller flat sections with exposed "steps" around each level. Sapient beings could build their homes on these steps, and convert some of them into agricultural terrace-farms covered with soil from the world above. Since this "underworld" is sunless, the crops they grow would likely have to be some form of fungus rather than green plants, such as are cultivated below ground by some varieties of ants. Heck, they could even [b']be[/b] ant-like. Or perhaps mammalian, but resembling real-world species adapted to life in the darkness, like moles. There could also be owl-men or bat-men flying between the pylons.

 

I'd say the pylons are tapered for some of the distance down and then just drop off, each edge or level being between 20 to 30 miles wide, the inside of pylons are hollow and with different levels as well accessble by tunnels that wind down to each level.

 

 

Some of these races may have colonized the world above, perhaps producing offshoots better adapted to life beneath the sun. OTOH the descendants of humans could also have found their way down to the pylons, evolving into Morlock-like albinos.

 

I like this as well, I'd like to think of this world as having been around for eons with the rise of fall of not only civilizations but entire groups intelligent species with ages in between where there were none.

 

 

 

The dark, infinite sea may be the home of monstrous aquatic races or gods opposed to the deities who created the world. Just imagine some of the nightmarish-looking things dwelling in the deepest parts of our world's oceans, given intelligence and manipulatory limbs. As enemies, their most logical ultimate goal would be to destroy the sun permanently, allowing them to overrrun the world above. Those who make their way up the pylons into the surface seas and lakes might, rather like H.P. Lovecraft's "Deep Ones," seek to mate with humans to produce hybrid offspring who can function freely on land during the day.

 

The idea of monstrous races/gods is definitely something I'd like to use along with races of "deep ones" who "infect" and interbreed with surface races using some kind of dark magick. The "Endless Sea" idea also works toward something else I'd been considering. That this world is one of hundreds or thousands of "worlds". All built on the mysterious pylons separated by hundreds of thousands or millions of miles. Each one could have it's own sun and be surrounded by "planets" and "moons" each also built upon the pylons and each with it's own ecosystem and creatures.

[薔薇語]

Re: A Whole New World

 

That this world is one of hundreds or thousands of "worlds". All built on the mysterious pylons separated by hundreds of thousands or millions of miles. Each one could have it's own sun and be surrounded by "planets" and "moons" each also built upon the pylons and each with it's own ecosystem and creatures.

 

Have you ever heard of SpellJammer for ADnD? This reminds me of that.

 

La Rose.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

You might also have really huge flyings ships flying over the waters of the "Endless Sea" between "worlds", built large and powerful to withstand attacks by the creatures below. Armed with "Fireball" cannons and as large as several city blocks.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

Have you ever heard of SpellJammer for ADnD? This reminds me of that.

 

La Rose.

Yes I own it. Great idea, didn't care much for the phlogisten though. The "Endless Sea" and worlds sitting on pylons I like though.

[Boric Slavelord]

Re: A Whole New World

 

I think I'll be calling this The Endless Sea campaign.