Catalog of the Weird Parallels

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Edit: As to name, I suppose just Mandela is an over used choice. What is evocative of a collection of reality chaff or random collection of similar items?

Do you perhaps mean "mandala"? Any connection to the former President of South Africa is eluding me.

As to your random collection that's a hodgepodge or soem word like that.

[Flyndaran]

The Mandela effect is a form of false memory unusually common in the populace.

It comes from how many remember reports of him dying in the 80s, despite that obviously not happening. Another example is how many misremember the Berenstain Bears as the Berenstein Bears.

[David Johnston2]

Lunatic-1 In 1966 on Lunatic-1 the moon was replaced by an object that looks very much like Peter Jackson's version of the Eye of Sauron. Much freaking out ensued. These days 1989 one of the largest churches in North America is the Church of Satan and mental illness and suicide greatly increased. Even the healthy minds experience frequent nightmares. A telepath or psi detector visiting Lunatic-1 will sense powerful but incomprehensible psionic projections blanketing the world. It is however, a very low mana world.

Lunatic-2 On Lunatic-2, the moon is substantially brighter than it is on normal worlds because it isn't reflecting the sun. Instead it somehow generates its own light, meaning that it is always full. Although the local year is 1945 judged by the stars, the local TL is 5, probably because of all of the werewolves. Any outtime werewolf visiting the world can change between its forms freely on any night, although doing so makes it hungry.

[zarawesome]

Rustic-2: Animals and plants handled by humans for more than a brief moment become sterile. Farming is impossible, and most of 18th century Earth is populated by just a few million hunter-gatherers. South America and Canada have cities, with fishing-based subsistence and decent boatmaking skills - when they can find good wood.

Langolier-1: If temporal inertia was measured in a scale and Lizardia was a 10, Langolier-1 would be somewhere in the thousands. The temporal inertia of this parallel is so high, in fact, that the death of every lifeform larger than a cockroach sometime in the 18th century did not keep history from marching on.

Cities are still built, used, and eventually demolished in Langolier-1, despite having no people in them. Come local time September 11, 2001, the World Trade Center simply turned into a pile of rubble overnight. Sometimes, you can even see vehicles move - sort of. They mostly do it when no visitors are looking, and when visitors do see it happening, it's accompained by a terrible psychic strain.

An uninhabited echo is an incredible temptation for espionage missions, but it wears agents down in weird ways. They start worrying they might be the next ones being revised, sort of thing.

[Flyndaran]

Rustic-2 would look a bit odd with no dogs too.

Langolier-1 would be studied if only to see which parallel it's perfectly mimicking by way of inertia. What if it's not Homeline?


Langolier-2 For two weeks everything looks like a mundane parallel. But on the 14th night, THEY come devouring everyone and everything. The next sunrise is night 1, where everything and everyone is back to existing and acting normally.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Rustic-2 would look a bit odd with no dogs too.

Langolier-1 would be studied if only to see which parallel it's perfectly mimicking by way of inertia. What if it's not Homeline?

Given that 9/11 was mentioned, it probably isn't, since the PoD between Homeline and our Earth is IIRC no later than 1995.

[awesomenessofme1]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

Given that 9/11 was mentioned, it probably isn't, since the PoD between Homeline and our Earth is IIRC no later than 1995.

There's an implicit reference in the Infinite Worlds book to a terrorist attack plan similar to 9/11 being foiled on Homeline.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

Given that 9/11 was mentioned, it probably isn't, since the PoD between Homeline and our Earth is IIRC no later than 1995.

Good point. I forgot that setting fact. But it should help to make visitors more curious about what timeline the inertia is sticking to.

Or am I the only one interested in that kind of thing?

[Kale]

Kent-1: Appears to closely follow the world of DC comics, but somehow there are no superheros. Bruce Wayne has become the chairman of the Wayne Charitable Foundation after his parents stepped down in retirement. Their tragic deaths never happen and Bruce is never pushed to become Batman. Lexcorp is the Wayne foundations' chief rival. Superman never shows up, and the Star Labs accident fails to imbue Barry Allen with superspeed. Outworlders will recognize much of the background of the world (Daily Planet is a popular print newspaper etc.) but the superheros are simply absent for unknown reasons, or have taken different paths that make them mundane.

[dcarson]

Originally Posted by Kale

Kent-1: Appears to closely follow the world of DC comics, but somehow there are no superheros.

Outworlders will recognize much of the background of the world (Daily Planet is a popular print newspaper etc.) but the superheros are simply absent for unknown reasons, or have taken different paths that make them mundane.

Throw in some tabloid papers for the PCs to see when they arrive and watch the players go nuts digging.