Catalog of the Weird Parallels

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by PTTG

Either that, or else we just re-file the whole worldline as a hell world.

It's probably not *that* far gone. No medical progress since the 1790s certainly wouldn't be, it would be fairly unpleasant with (somewhat) higher populations and a disease environment linked by even faster travel, but not really hell world levels.

It's the late widespread adoption, and inability to notice the uselessness of something that was pretty heavily critiqued as nonsensical even when it was a new idea that's the tricky part - with it's implication the medical treatment has potentially gotten worse and that something is somehow tampering with even basic human observation skills, let alone the scientific process, that open the option.

[Astromancer]

Rifting off of PTTG's last statement and having seen a magazine article yesterday on comic images of Hell in American movies (didn't get to read it) I suggest a parallel that is literal Hell! Basically, this parallel is Hell, but the devil got tired of all that torture garbage.

This Hell is basically a sort of dullish resort community planetwide. The continents are roughly where they are on a normal Earth. Everything is attractive, the food is good, the amenities are grand, but the people are creeps. Mind you it is getting better. Everyone is in some kind of therapy. The demons, bored to tears with always having to keep the dammed (as creepy a bunch of masochists as you'd ever find) tortured, are overjoyed to switch to being therapists. Most of them are as yet more enthusiastic than skillful, but they care. Besides, they call the shots now.

Still, it is Hell and seems to lack the legendary "Good Company." The PCs would likely get earnest, if ineffectual, help from the demons, and real trouble from the dammed.

[PTTG]

Might I suggest the temporary designation Other People?

[Flyndaran]

Or just Sartre 1.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by PTTG

Might I suggest the temporary designation Other People?

Both you and Flyndaran show deep insight.

[Astromancer]

Homeline, Centrum, and the Cabal have gotten used to Reality Quakes but this parallel still weirds them out. This Q6 parallel called Frye has a regular sequence of reality quakes. The Reality Quakes always work in the same way. Spring's Reality Quake makes comedy the law of the universe. Summer shifts to Romance. Tragedy, the myth of autumn rules this parallel in the fall. Winter is owned by Irony and Satire. Trust me Christmas is rarely fun on this world.

The various phases of each mode seem to dominate in one area or the other. Thus one town may experience in May a Sixth Comedy while its Suburbs may be going through a third Comedy, and both First and Fifth Comedies take place at the local University. The people seem to deal fairly well with the chaos. Note: Literature and critical theory are very well known on this parallel.

[Flyndaran]

If it's a natural cycle of physics, would it really qualify as reality quakes?
I imagine cross-timers argue over that issue.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

If it's a natural cycle of physics, would it really qualify as reality quakes?
I imagine cross-timers argue over that issue.

If reality quakes are as regular as clockwork it could be confusing.

[Culture20]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

If it's a natural cycle of physics, would it really qualify as reality quakes?
I imagine cross-timers argue over that issue.

If it rewrites history so that the current season’s quake “is how the world has always been”...

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Culture20

If it rewrites history so that the current season’s quake “is how the world has always been”...

Ah, see I don't see any mention of history changing. That would far more clearly define the weirdness as reality quakes as far as most paraphysicists would, I think.

I was just musing about how much reality has to change regularly for it to count as cyclical reality quakes rather than just natural cycles.

If gravity was half strength every day but Tuesdays, would that be cyclical quakes or just variant physics?