Dragons: A theorem

[Exrage]

When Spitfyre on Skalkaar talks about the 8 mages, he refers to the entire group as "meddlesome bipeds" and is pretty condescending about the Ritual, which makes it sound like it was purely a biped effort to me.

Very good point, you could also take it as if there were dragons involved they made it a point to cover it up.

I agree with Awdz's outlook on the mechanics vs. lore thing too. Just because the mechanics change doesn't mean that your character's back story is suddenly undone, it just means there was a change in the current situation. E.g., the devs increased the base armor dragons got per level in the past, but they also explained it in the game as recent development ("Our scales seem have hardened of late, perhaps a surge of Prime is to blame?" or something like that; I'd have to go read it again).

For a single point, such as the reasoning dragons armor suddenly increased, using the mechanic for lore purposes is fine. The point I'm trying to argue is using multiple points for a single mechanic for lore purposes isn't okay. The example of that would be stating that dragons armor was inferior to the lesser races so they had to strengthen it. Multiple points and factors brought in over one mechanic, where if that mechanic changes now the basis of that entire theorem is gone which if you were basing RP on it would suddenly be less realistic as now you're stuck back pedaling.

The Academy of Draak had been established for thousands of years at this point, and the undead weren't even a thing until several hundred years later. I highly doubt they were preoccupied with teaching any bipeds either--the splintering of magic did not occur for another 200 or so years, and why would you be trying to teach magic to a population that had just fought against you and declared themselves free of your rule?

For this stuff to almost get to the point of dragons killing dragons, I really do think the argument of how to handle the bipeds was pretty much the foremost dragon concern for this period of time.

Because that's a blink in the eye of dragons history, a mere 150 years which you could postulate as not even an entire generation's worth of time progressing as dragons as a race live well into the hundreds and thousands of years mark. Another case to bring up is that of Helian philosophy, they are to guide the lesser races- at what point do you think they would begin trying to steer them back to the correct path, hundreds of years afterward to ensure a generation or two have passed before retrying with the possibility of deep seeded hatred and disrespect from the previous generation, or the instant they notice the lesser starting to consider going down a wrong path averting the disaster entirely?

I would also point out that previously mentioned events hadn't reached a conclusion- or one that had been mentioned in the lore as an actual resolution. We still have a petrified city with a dragon researching it, and we still have dragons working with schools and cities across Istaria- all of which would have been there for the hundreds of years when those incidents occurred. Why would they have stopped to fight about something they themselves have already sacrificed much trying to research and correct?

"Jack of all trades, master of none" is what Primal magic makes me think of. To me, anything with a generalized use cannot have the utility that more speciliazed forms do. This is reflected in-game with the amount of spells that bipeds have vs. the amount of spells that dragons have.

That would be backward, "specialized" implies they have a specific purpose and eliminate focusing on another other than what they specialize in while "utility" implies it's usage in multiple situations which is what a generalized tool is designed for.

Furthermore I'd simple restate my case- if the lesser races are forced to splinter magics that produces such high yielding results why would a dragon- something that lives for hundreds if not thousands of years- continue to watch this proven fact be repeatedly demonstrated and not have a definitive agreement or rebuttal? If they state that it is "lesser", that implies a negative drawback or a shortsightedness as they don't use phrases implying a religious disagreement or hatred outside the lunus who are anticipating the need for violence.

On the contrary, dragons speak of lesser races as children and tend to be worried over their future and that of Istaria, and with the lore demonstrating time after time a lesser race misusing magic or abusing the other lesser races as letting them do as they are continuing to do requires a change, one that the dragons are so conflicted on to the point of violence demonstrating the severity of their continued offenses.

Where I am having trouble with your thesis that "splintered magic is superior to primal magic" is that if it were the case why haven't the dragons been the ones subjugated or a lesser race able to best them at their own game at any point during the long history of the lore? The sleeper's banishment wasn't an all-out assault against dragon-kind that they were defending against, it was another thief-in-the-night moment where a few individuals capitalized on the continued grace dragons showed them and made a huge mistake at the dragons expense. The second the dragons as a whole become involved seriously, everything but them is killed, burned, or forced to yield to them with a few exceptions on an individual basis. To state that the lesser races hold more power than them and other than saying "we're not under your rule anymore" not demonstrating their independence or returning the favor toward dragons is a huge hole in that theory, if splintered magic is truly superior a force of magic wielding lesser races would easily stop them at any point since it's development.

A character being a character can believe anything the player wants that character to, and in turn your own characters are able to disbelieve or believe whatever you want them to. But it also very important to remember that players can have different beliefs and interpretations also, and just because a view is different doesn't make it wrong.

Wrong, no. Incohesive to the point it ruins the RP? Yes. If it can be avoided, why not do what you can to nip it in the bud instead of letting it wreak havoc on your good time?

This is very true. No matter how much discussion there is, sometimes there is just not going to be an agreement on what interpretation of lore/mechanics is "correct."

When situations in RP come up where there is a conflict between different interpretations of the lore, I find it is much better to try to come to some sort of compromise than it is to try to convince the other player that I am right and they are wrong, because all that leads to is an argument. How exactly the situation is handled would depend on exactly what the issue is, but I would doubt that there exist too many situations where two players can have such vastly differing views that there is not any way to work around it in the RP.

"Correct" lore is a combination of plausibility and general acceptance. If the majority of the players agree that Istarian dragons are from the realm of Fire, what happens when someone brings in a dragon that isn't from the realm of fire? For many, the RP is instantly broken and they simply move on, for those trying to help them they get into hours of debate that ends exactly as you've stated. How are we able to avoid this? By giving them the option of "hey, check out the theorem" and leaving it at that.

Having discussed the lore with devs in support of my book, I can assure you that it none of the timeline lore was hip-fired. There is definite history they adhere to and will not change.

Hip-fired lore isn't timeline lore, sorry if I ever made it seem that way. My example was to that of the khutit form, developed so the mechanics would allow ancient dragons to fit into crafting areas and the shady back story of runes that didn't even make it into the timeline and nothing more.

The artifact was a dryad thing - why would dragons even have known about it?

Unless it were hidden and with the express purposes of the dryads to remain not to public knowledge, why wouldn't the dragons who worked alongside the dryads throughout history not be trusted with it's knowledge? What would the dryads have gained from hiding and employing it on their own, or would it have been crafted from their deity with the express instructions to use it at the time it was used?

Dragon magic affects pretty much everything. Bipeds could not master it, so they took individual aspects of it and pushed their limits on the single aspect, "splintered" magic. The splintered magic does not affect everything equally well - this is reflected in game mechanics where somethings are resistant to and others are susceptible to a given magic type, but basically everything is affected by primal magic equally well. Because the "splintered" magic is only effective against specific circumstances, dragons eschew it as lesser.

Pretty much my theory to a T. Why "fix" something that isn't broken, or rather break something that's "whole" with the interpretation that there isn't a drawback like this. Primal magic exploits the weaknesses of the elements employed against it, and strengthen itself where necessary for specific effects as needed, otherwise why would denizens of the realm of fire choose to live here if the elements of fire could be stronger than that of the prime?

I'm not sure what you mean by a theorem. Something like, if it is a game mechanic or official lore, it is real to the characters, if it is not conflicting with a game mechanice or official lore, it is a reasonable character perspective, and if it conflicts with game mechanics or official lore, others should consider the character somewhat crazy for believing it? Good luck getting all roleplayers to adhere to one theorem; it's worse than herding cats.

A theorem is a collection of theories, conflicting or not, that are put together side by side and elaborated on here. In another day or two I'll recap what has been established, make it easy to reference and be pretty on the eyes, and we'll start again- hopefully with more input from more RPers. This way we stay within the realm of in-game lore and mechanics yet define a set of common "truths" that will help any new RPer easily fit in with the generalized play style and realize what areas are open for exploration and individual flare and what areas are more controversial and attempting to change them becomes more detrimental to the RP experience.