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      Welcome!   03/05/2016

      Welcome, everyone, to the new 910CMX Community Forums. I'm still working on getting them running, so things may change.  If you're a 910 Comic creator and need your forum recreated, let me know and I'll get on it right away.  I'll do my best to make this new place as fun as the last one!
Scotty

Story, Monday February 5, 2018

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2 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Pharaoh, how did you guys do it in ancient Egypt?

We had a simple system.

Hippos and crocodiles are dangerous to humans in or near the river. So humans in or near the river had the responsibility to remain aware of their presence.

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32 minutes ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

We had a simple system.

Hippos and crocodiles are dangerous to humans in or near the river. So humans in or near the river had the responsibility to remain aware of their presence.

That's a clever alarm system. So whenever you heard someone in the Nile go, "AAAAARGH AAAAAARRRGHH I AM BEING EATEN BY A CROCODILE" you knew there were crocodiles in the vicinity. In fact, I hear Disney World uses that very same alarm system today.

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6 hours ago, mlooney said:
8 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Of course, it may not be few YEARS. It's quite possible the questioning about next reset will happen in months or WEEKS.

And won't that be fun.

For values of fun that include "make both DBG and Tedd go nuts".

It will be probably values of fun that include lot of death. But preventing individual deaths is not objective of magic.

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Of course it wouldn't be that easy. Though all they've established is that it cannot be hidden, not whether or not it should be hidden. Most humans would figure that once you establish that a thing cannot be hidden, then whether or not it should be hidden is a moot point, but Magic doesn't think like most humans. It likely wouldn't care about having to reset continuously until the secrecy sticks, which could (and, most likely, would) be never. Maybe if the knowledge of the magic reset spreads to enough people that the reset does not meaningfully reduce the number of people that know about it, then Magic would be forced to abandon the secrecy notion regardless of what it or the seer's think.

23 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

The mist around their legs seems pretty strong in the last two panels. I hope that doesn't mean Magic is about to dismiss them.

I doubt Magic is about to dismiss them.

From a Watsonian perspective, Magic wants logic and perspective from the seers. It has deemed the logic it has been presented with so far to be insufficient for magic going public. To send them back now would prevent them from presenting more logic and perspective, especially if the reason the logic is insufficient is because Magic doesn't care about if it could remain secret, only if it should. The seers obviously want minimal changes (even though Arthur is reluctant in that regard), so why not let them present more logic?

From a Doylist perspective, Tedd just won a significant victory by convincing Arthur that changing the rules to keep the secrecy is pointless. To have Magic declare their logic insufficient and boot them home without giving them a chance to supply more information would simple pull the rug out from under her. There a plenty of writers who would do that, but Dan isn't normally that mean to his characters.

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5 hours ago, Drasvin said:

...all they've established is that it [Magic] cannot be hidden, not whether or not it should be hidden. Most humans would figure that once you establish that a thing cannot be hidden, then whether or not it should be hidden is a moot point, but Magic doesn't think like most humans. It likely wouldn't care about having to reset continuously until the secrecy sticks, which could (and, most likely, would) be never.

Thank you.  You have more eloquently expressed the idea I was unable to coherently form at one in the morning.

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2 minutes ago, animalia said:

So in other words Magic is an immortal two year old?

Magic is arguably millenniae or even dozens of millenniae old. But in terms of human experience it has nothing at all except what it can glean from its very tenuous encounters with human minds.

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10 hours ago, ijuin said:
17 hours ago, animalia said:

So in other words Magic is an immortal two year old?

According to Pandora, Magic is a butt face.

Why not both?

 

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On 2/6/2018 at 11:44 AM, Drasvin said:

Of course it wouldn't be that easy. Though all they've established is that it cannot be hidden, not whether or not it should be hidden. Most humans would figure that once you establish that a thing cannot be hidden, then whether or not it should be hidden is a moot point, but Magic doesn't think like most humans. It likely wouldn't care about having to reset continuously until the secrecy sticks, which could (and, most likely, would) be never. Maybe if the knowledge of the magic reset spreads to enough people that the reset does not meaningfully reduce the number of people that know about it, then Magic would be forced to abandon the secrecy notion regardless of what it or the seer's think.

This brought to mind the following scenario:

A world where everybody has gotten used to magic changing regularly, and the Will of Magic never consults any Seers because the Second Purpose is common knowledge. Then one day when preparing for a new change, the Will of Magic finds a kid who happens to not have heard of the Second Purpose.

The Will of Magic tells the child, "You are to help decide whether the rules of Magic shall be severely changed to keep it hidden, or if minimal changes shall be made to accommodate it's reveal."

The child replies, "Huh? But everybody knows about magic."

The Will of Magic still doesn't get it.

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2 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

A world where everybody has gotten used to magic changing regularly, and the Will of Magic never consults any Seers because the Second Purpose is common knowledge. Then one day when preparing for a new change, the Will of Magic finds a kid who happens to not have heard of the Second Purpose.

The Will of Magic tells the child, "You are to help decide whether the rules of Magic shall be severely changed to keep it hidden, or if minimal changes shall be made to accommodate it's reveal."

The child replies, "Huh? But everybody knows about magic."

The Will of Magic still doesn't get it.

I would argue that the Will of Magic should be able to realize the futility even without seers to consult, but on the other hand ... it's inability to understand humans MAY go this far.

Also, in age of internet, no problem. Every saturday morning, after reset, seers publish new rules and during the weekend, magic users will look them up.

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4 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I would argue that the Will of Magic should be able to realize the futility even without seers to consult, but on the other hand ... it's inability to understand humans MAY go this far.

Also, in age of internet, no problem. Every saturday morning, after reset, seers publish new rules and during the weekend, magic users will look them up.

I wonder if people will eventually get tired of it or irate about it.

It'd be literally like Wizards of the Coast publishing new editions of the D&D rule books every week.

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8 minutes ago, Scotty said:

I wonder if people will eventually get tired of it or irate about it.

It'd be literally like Wizards of the Coast publishing new editions of the D&D rule books every week.

Sometime it sure seems like they do....

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8 hours ago, Scotty said:

I wonder if people will eventually get tired of it or irate about it.

It'd be literally like Wizards of the Coast publishing new editions of the D&D rule books every week.

 

8 hours ago, CritterKeeper said:

Sometime it sure seems like they do....

Oh, come on.  WotC has only put out 5 version of D&D1 after they got the rights, and 2 of those don't count because the didn't happen2.

1 3, 3.5, 4, "Essentials", 5

2 4 and Essentials

 

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On 2/6/2018 at 9:44 AM, Drasvin said:

Of course it wouldn't be that easy. Though all they've established is that it cannot be hidden, not whether or not it should be hidden.

Not only that. The Will of Magic is not only asking about whether magic should or shouldn't remain hidden, it's also asking about whether there should be a major change.

The three seers now agree that it can't be hidden, but they are technically mistaken: it can be hidden quite effectively by making it nonexistent. Granted, I doubt WoM would go for that... but how about a system where magic is very tightly constricted, only seers can do magic or (maybe) grant others the ability to do magic and the granting must be done by direct person-to-person physical contact with mutual consent...

If it effectively can't be hidden, then the question of whether it should be hidden is moot. However, that does not establish that there shouldn't be a major change. One could argue that the existing magic system is a bad one to go public with and that a different fundamental design would be better. If that argument were to win, then there would be a major change in how magic works followed by the seers being free - if not encouraged - to go public with it.

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4 minutes ago, Don Edwards said:

The three seers now agree that it can't be hidden, but they are technically mistaken: it can be hidden quite effectively by making it nonexistent. Granted, I doubt WoM would go for that... but how about a system where magic is very tightly constricted, only seers can do magic or (maybe) grant others the ability to do magic and the granting must be done by direct person-to-person physical contact with mutual consent...

The fact seers will be given knowledge how to teach others to use magic after reset suggests that the option of making magic nonexistent is not on table. Also, that granting on person-to-person contact is not going to slow it so much ... look at how many people can gather at fantasy convention.

6 minutes ago, Don Edwards said:

If it effectively can't be hidden, then the question of whether it should be hidden is moot. However, that does not establish that there shouldn't be a major change. One could argue that the existing magic system is a bad one to go public with and that a different fundamental design would be better. If that argument were to win, then there would be a major change in how magic works followed by the seers being free - if not encouraged - to go public with it.

This, meanwhile, is question noone seem to ask, despite making VERY good sense and Dan even directly mentioning it in commentary. Even the way WoM is presenting the question suggests noone thinks about it. Which may mean that the big change in how magic work is mostly internal and the rules itself are not supposed to change much ... possibly because WoM can't think of any better rules.

Note also that if magic WILL go public, there IS supposed to be some small change. Maybe this change will be small but with big effect ... something like rising everyone's magic defense may still be option.

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1 hour ago, Don Edwards said:

Not only that. The Will of Magic is not only asking about whether magic should or shouldn't remain hidden, it's also asking about whether there should be a major change.

The way Magic is presenting the choice is that either there is a major change with the goal of keeping magic hidden, OR there are minor changes and magic goes public.

Quote

If it effectively can't be hidden, then the question of whether it should be hidden is moot. However, that does not establish that there shouldn't be a major change. One could argue that the existing magic system is a bad one to go public with and that a different fundamental design would be better. If that argument were to win, then there would be a major change in how magic works followed by the seers being free - if not encouraged - to go public with it.

Exactly what I've pointed out a few times now.  Magic clearly doesn't have this angle in mind, but that doesn't mean that the humans can't discuss it.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

The fact seers will be given knowledge how to teach others to use magic after reset suggests that the option of making magic nonexistent is not on table. Also, that granting on person-to-person contact is not going to slow it so much ... look at how many people can gather at fantasy convention.

You seem to have a very strange idea of what a fantasy convention is like.  It's a bunch of people who love reading science-fiction and fantasy, and want to talk about it, discuss favorite authors and shows, explore implications of the fictional worlds and magic systems they love....but if anything, people at SF/F cons are on average more aware of the difference between reality and fantasy that mundane folk are.

Quote

This, meanwhile, is question noone seem to ask,

*jumps up and down waving arms*

*dons T-shirt reading "NO ONE"*

On 1/29/2018 at 11:28 AM, CritterKeeper said:

Hmm, so if Magic doesn't make a big change, right now, then it will never make a big change again??

That means that one of the important questions right now is, "Is the current system of magic a good one?  Is it the one we want to get stuck with?"  Or would we have a good chance of the next system being a better one?  Can its inequities and flaws be fixed with 'minor changes'?  Do the Seers and the rest of humanity have zero input on what sort of minor changes are made, since their job is apparently only to help Magic decide whether to make a big change or a little one?  Would the world be better off with one magic system, forever, or with systems that change if someone figures out ways to abuse them too badly?

 

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4 hours ago, CritterKeeper said:

You seem to have a very strange idea of what a fantasy convention is like.  It's a bunch of people who love reading science-fiction and fantasy, and want to talk about it, discuss favorite authors and shows, explore implications of the fictional worlds and magic systems they love....but if anything, people at SF/F cons are on average more aware of the difference between reality and fantasy that mundane folk are.

You should talk about what's strange with organisers of conventions I was on.

Sure, fans of science-fiction especially are painfully aware of the difference between reality and fantasy ... but we are talking about seers who will be able to provide example. It's the opposition who considers belief more important than reality: science people tend to accept results of experiments, no matter what they predicted the results will be, and sci-fi people would likely accept them faster if it would be what they wanted instead of what they expected.

BTW, do you remember eugenics wars? Big conflict in 1990s, affecting more than a quarter of our planet, featuring genetically enhanced people? No? Well, be careful telling that to Star Trek fans. Especially around the yearly anniversary of First Contact with Vulcans. The -50th anniversary in 2013 was especially big event.

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2 hours ago, hkmaly said:

BTW, do you remember eugenics wars? Big conflict in 1990s, affecting more than a quarter of our planet, featuring genetically enhanced people? No? Well, be careful telling that to Star Trek fans. Especially around the yearly anniversary of First Contact with Vulcans. The -50th anniversary in 2013 was especially big event.

My great, great, great, great grandson will save the world by traveling back to the 1980s to get some humpbacks.

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2 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
2 hours ago, Scotty said:

My great, great, great, great grandson will save the world by traveling back to the 1980s to get some humpbacks.

Write him a letter and tell him I am going to want my time machine back!

He didn't used time machine. He used a dangerous course around sun in warp speed.

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19 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

If it effectively can't be hidden, then the question of whether it should be hidden is moot.

I wouldn't be surprised if I'm wrong, but I currently have the impression that the Will of Magic doesn't care if the question is moot, it still wants to hear an argument for or against hiding magic.

9 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
12 hours ago, hkmaly said:

BTW, do you remember eugenics wars? Big conflict in 1990s, affecting more than a quarter of our planet, featuring genetically enhanced people? No? Well, be careful telling that to Star Trek fans. Especially around the yearly anniversary of First Contact with Vulcans. The -50th anniversary in 2013 was especially big event.

Oh that old thing. Yeah, I remember that. I won.

So you were the one Khan and his cronies were running from in the sleeper ship Botany Bay?

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