Alternate Earths 3, What Worlds? (hypothetical)

[Glamourweaver]

Originally Posted by tratclif

I'm not sure I'd want a whole write up on just Centrum Beta, but some people like Centrum more than Infinity. We could use a world or worlds on the Centrum side of the Quanta that Infinity can't get to.

Interesting idea....

What I'd like to see at that end of the Quanta are examples of how Homeline isn't special in that worlds seem to be defined by how they relate to it (Quanta shifts based on following its history etc.) Thats just Infinity's biased perspective that arrises from a) the inherincy of human nature to define things in relation to oneself & b) their limited view of the Quantum field.

Ways to demonstrate that point would be...

-Alternates that follow the Centrum timeline but diverge from it later (i.e. from the Homeline perspective, they diverge just as Centrum does, but Diverge after that point from Centrum history). [i.e. present day world where the Franco-English Empire still stands, the Last War never having happened; World where the Last War ended very differently to the Centrum's horror (their version of Reich-5); world where Indian techno-alchemical break throughs pushed back the Franco-English Empire in the Middle Ages, etc. etc. etc.]

- Same principle as above, but with other worlds like Caliph, Shikaku-Mon, Cornwallis, Dixie, etc. [What if the USA had moved to reoccupy the South after WW1?]

- Echoes, or even future versions of major Alternate Worlds we already know (ala Centrum Beta) [Shikaku-Mon Echo during the Britannic War, much later version of Britannica-7 where Masculinist movement is fighting for civil equity for men; etc. etc.]

- Worlds that work like Burton except around stories & myths not found on Homeline.....

[Tom Kalbfus]

How about an alternate Earth that was physically different. For instance what if the continents of North and South America were submerged but all the rest of the contents are the same as in our world. The Atlantic and Pacific Oceans are merged to form a single ocean which is called the Atlantic. The Atlantic laps on the shores of both Europe and Asia, ahd there is a very long chain of island stretching from where Alaska would be all the way down to Chile. These Island chain is called the Rocky Islands, and some of those islands like St Helens are actually volcanic. These areas provide good fishing grounds if nothing else.

Humans have still managed to evolve in Africa on this world and they migrated to Europe, Asia, and Austrailia. Another significant difference is there are no horses, as they would have evolved in North America and that continent doesn't exist. Europe is a colder place that in our world. The Sahara Desert begins further south, the Arabian Penisula is covered with forests, and it snows frequently in Italy and Spain during the winter. The British Isles has a subarctic climate and some tundra in Scotland, with a small nomadic population of reindeer herders. Reindeer and Oxen have taken the place of horses in this world. You can call this The World of no Americas. The tech level of this place is optional. Based on a book I've read, where I got this idea from, I'd make the technology somewhere around the level that existed during World War I, with biplanes, and automobiles. There is also a War going on in Europe, started by a country whose borders roughly coinside with Germany and Italy, and they seem to be at war with two countries whose borders approximate the locations of France and Spain. There is a country to the south in North Africa which is so far neutral in this conflict. The main religions of this world are polytheistic, but its deities are not related to the forces of nature and take on instead a philisophical bent, their are good deities and bad ones, they are considered powereful by the believers but not omnipotent. The question of who created the Universe is not considered as the Universe is considered to have always existed. Astronomers are only now discovering the existance of other galaxies in their telescopes, where a few short years earlier the Milky Way Galaxy was considered to be the entire Universe. Anyway their is a War to fight with the Empire of Raveria which has started this conflict which threatens to turn global.

[Qoltar]

World without the Americas?

Already been done - at leaast in paperback books . Pretty sure it was called Two Hawks From Earth and it was written by Philip Jose Farmer. Pretty good read.

In the book there was a chain of islands where we have the Rocky mountains (Appalacia, Andes...) on our world ..so it was "there" but not there.

- E.W. Charlton

[xerxes]

How about an alternate where aliens conquer Earth in the 1950's?

I don't recall any use of aliens in Infinite Worlds material (maybe Caliph in AE2).

[Ed the Coastie]

Not really fleshed out, but rather some ideas off of the top of my head.

• Madoc-1: Prince Madoc of Wales and his followers did indeed settle area around Mobile Bay and their civilization thrived.
• Inca Ultraterrestria: A colony of Ancient Astronauts survives in the Andes, and uses its high technology to help the Inca fight off the Europeans.
• Topsy-Turvey-2: A geological pole shift occured roughly 1000 years ago, throwing civilization into ruin.
• Spandex: If Shikaku-mon can have espionage as a hobby, why not a world where the people actually began emulating the Mystery Men of the pre-WWII pulp magazines? Heroes of this world rely upon physical prowess, gadgets, and/or mesmerism to provide their "powers".
• Saharan Swamp: Due to it's almost sea-level elevation, this world's Sarara was never able to serve as the breadbasket of the Roman Empire.
• Norton: "Emperor Norton" of San Francisco is embraced by that city's populace and taken seriously, leading to California becoming a seperate nation with Norton (and his descendents) as figurehead monarchs.

[tratclif]

Originally Posted by xerxes

How about an alternate where aliens conquer Earth in the 1950's?

I don't recall any use of aliens in Infinite Worlds material (maybe Caliph in AE2).

Caliph has been retconned to be limited to the Solar System in IW. But there is Leviathan (invaders from the ocean destroy early 19th century Earth). Ken Hite had a "Harry Turtledove WorldWar tribute" line in the manuscript for IW where the Gormelites from GURPS Aliens invade 1960s Earth, but that got cut for length.

[Tom Kalbfus]

Originally Posted by Qoltar

World without the Americas?

Already been done - at leaast in paperback books . Pretty sure it was called Two Hawks From Earth and it was written by Philip Jose Farmer. Pretty good read.

In the book there was a chain of islands where we have the Rocky mountains (Appalacia, Andes...) on our world ..so it was "there" but not there.

- E.W. Charlton

Yeah, that's the book I read. I read it in the early 1980s as I recall. Haven't seen it in print lately and I lost the original copy I had. I do recall there were two people Banestormed into this World from World War II. One was a German Fighter Pilot, and another was an American-Indian Bomber crewman, I think he was a gunner. Well a Banestorm (GURPS Parlance) took both planest to this No Americas World and their continued their duel in this alternate sky. I believe the Bomber was shot down. The German landed in the aggressor Nation's territory and he became a technical assistant to the further development of that nation's air force. Two Hawks (The American Indian) landed in the Western Nation's territory and became a technical assistant for that nation's air force. As I recall, Europe was inhabited by Asians, and caucasian "white people" were nonexistant in thie world, the German fighter pilot of course sticks out like a sore thumb among this world's populations. As we later learn, Two Hawks is not from our Earth either, although the German fighter pilot is. Two Hawks comes from an Alternate where the Kaiser's son starts World War II instead of Hitler. this world would make an interesting addition to an Infinite Worlds campaign.

[Tom Kalbfus]

Then there is Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. Somehow this world get ahold of advanced technology such as rayguns, submersible P-51 fighter plains, and flying British Aircraft carriers. It appears to be the 1940s where The Wizard of Oz is still shown at Radio City Music Hall In Manhattan. The landscape around Manhattan looks more rugged than what I would expect, since I leave here. Apparently among the expensive posh landscape of Upper Westchester or New England, their is a Mercenary Base of Aviators called the Sky Captians. One of them has access to a minaturized laser pistol, from where, I do not know. Just after a News reporter meets with a German Scientist just off of the Hindenburg III, the city is invaded by Giant Robots, apparently produced by a Rogue Russian scientist just after World War I. The Russian scientist died and his robots carried on his work of producing a giant interstellar Ark. spaceship, whose rocket engines are apperently so powerful as to set the Earth's atmosphere on fire if it ever reaches an altitude of 100 miles. There are several consistency problems here, but I'm not going point them out.

[tratclif]

Originally Posted by Tom Kalbfus

T There are several consistency problems [with Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow], but I'm not going point them out.

Now, I really like the film, but I think I was up to 6 "say what?" moments by the time the airship docked, and realized this was a turn off your brain and watch the pretty pictures movie.

We already have Gernsback from AE. We have a short writeup of Lucifer-5 in IW (a meteor destroys St Petersburg, Russia in 1908, leaving the mysterious "petrinium" in the crater. In 1919, Manfred von Richthofen rides the atomic torch rocket to orbit), and Reality Futura from a Suppressed Transmission column.

Instead of new worlds, we might actually need some adventures set in the existing worlds.

[Fionn The Otaku]

Originally Posted by Ed the Coastie

Not really fleshed out, but rather some ideas off of the top of my head.

• Madoc-1: Prince Madoc of Wales and his followers did indeed settle area around Mobile Bay and their civilization thrived.
• Inca Ultraterrestria: A colony of Ancient Astronauts survives in the Andes, and uses its high technology to help the Inca fight off the Europeans.
• Topsy-Turvey-2: A geological pole shift occured roughly 1000 years ago, throwing civilization into ruin.
• Spandex: If Shikaku-mon can have espionage as a hobby, why not a world where the people actually began emulating the Mystery Men of the pre-WWII pulp magazines? Heroes of this world rely upon physical prowess, gadgets, and/or mesmerism to provide their "powers".
• Saharan Swamp: Due to it's almost sea-level elevation, this world's Sarara was never able to serve as the breadbasket of the Roman Empire.
• Norton: "Emperor Norton" of San Francisco is embraced by that city's populace and taken seriously, leading to California becoming a seperate nation with Norton (and his descendents) as figurehead monarchs.

Madoc-1 and Norton sound the most interesting. Of course any write up of Madoc-1 would almost have to mention Granuaile-3 in which the Irish Pirate queen Grace O'Malley founded a colony on North America's east coast and started a (mostly Irish) Gaelic Migration to the Hudson River Valley.