Infinite worlds: The Earth of Shadowrun

[redwulfe]

I was wondering and please forgive my ignorance of Infinite Worlds setting, but if the divergence happened in say 80's or 90' or whatnot and the effect of goblinization is an expression of genetic traits the suddenly are expressed do to the return of magic. Then wouldn't people in homeline potentially have these traits but have not expressed? Also if the team visit the SR universe during the year of the comet wouldn't it also be possible even without the necessary genes.

I like that the world was classified as a zone of extreme caution. It would be kind of neat to have a team need to go to the world and have it be in the 4th edition world and there last given information was from the 3rd edition world.

[Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2]

Originally Posted by redwulfe

I like that the world was classified as a zone of extreme caution. It would be kind of neat to have a team need to go to the world and have it be in the 4th edition world and there last given information was from the 3rd edition world.

Wouldn't an edition upgrade come under the heading of a reality quake?

Another bone to gnaw on: modern calendars are only loosely based on astronomy. New Years at January 1, the length of the months, and the Year One of the calendar are all the results of political choices and compromises. Couldn't the "Year One" be different? In the Shadowrun example, the currently-used calendar year could be in the 2070's but the astronomical evidence could say 2020's. That could allow a current-edition Shadowrun crossover.

[Warlockco]

Originally Posted by Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2

Wouldn't an edition upgrade come under the heading of a reality quake?

Another bone to gnaw on: modern calendars are only loosely based on astronomy. New Years at January 1, the length of the months, and the Year One of the calendar are all the results of political choices and compromises. Couldn't the "Year One" be different? In the Shadowrun example, the currently-used calendar year could be in the 2070's but the astronomical evidence could say 2020's. That could allow a current-edition Shadowrun crossover.

Evil, I like it.

[redwulfe]

Would this mean the point of devergence happened 2070 years in the past. From what some people have said is that no world in the infinate Worlds setting are in the future of homelines setting. This was cercumvented in Stargate by saying that some civilisations did not have a dark ages and continued a constant stream of advancement and that is why there are technologically superior humans even though all humans came from earth.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by redwulfe

I was wondering and please forgive my ignorance of Infinite Worlds setting, but if the divergence happened in say 80's or 90' or whatnot and the effect of goblinization is an expression of genetic traits the suddenly are expressed do to the return of magic. Then wouldn't people in homeline potentially have these traits but have not expressed?

Putting the divergence in the 1990s or 80s is more a matter of "observed divergence" rather than reality. The Patrol would look at the history books, and peg it at 1990 (or whenever the series of decisions that led up to the Seretech case started). Then, as more of Shadowrun's real history came to light, the catalogers would start moving the point of divergence back in time, while the Patrolmen on the ground broke out in a cold sweat.

In the Infinite Worlds setting, Homeline is Real Earth, more or less, up until the 1990s when the devices to travel to alternate timelines were created. No magically powerful ancient civilizations, no dragons and immortal elves shaping history from the shadows, etc. As far as anyone can determine, Homeline has always been no-mana. That's why evidence of beings with mana-active genes arriving on Homeline in the past would worry Homeliners so much.

Originally Posted by redwulfe

Also if the team visit the SR universe during the year of the comet wouldn't it also be possible even without the necessary genes.

I'm pretty sure that SURGE effects were explained as the higher magic levels causing previously unexpressed metagenes to surface. You might get cat ears and lizard scales, but it was because, somewhere in your family tree, you had ancestors whose magical genes were expressed as cat ears and lizard scales.
With the possible exception of really weird things like the Ganges manaline surge, which seems to have honestly transformed previous-normal people. So I suppose a Patrolman who happened to be bathing in the Ganges at the right time might end up with blue skin, four arms, and three eyes. :-)

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by walkir

Although I don't think they will really understand that, ever.

Well, they'll get the shape of things. A being capable of taking over one of the eight largest companies in the world, not just buying a controlling interest, but buying outright, and doing it in a such a manner as to be undetected until he announced his fiat accompli, is not someone to trifle with. :-)

Originally Posted by walkir

Has the Cabal people living long enough to plan for centuries?

Oh yes. And ISWAT occasionally recruits people with similar planning horizons - consider Janos Telkozep, the vampire iconic character from Basic. I imagine that the immortals in ISWAT would drop Patrol HQ a few warnings to tread lightly once the age of the great dragons became apparent (which was fairly quickly, IIRC - I think Dunkelzahn made it clear that the greats were from the previous age of magic in his first interview).

Originally Posted by walkir

As we are at the cabal, how to include the metaplanes...

Well, the Cabalists would probably just handwave the Astral as being the old familiar Astra plane, just with a far greater degree of overlap than is typical. The metaplanes would probably be explained as being pocket dimensions in the Astral, or regions in Briah, depending (the Metaplane of Fire is, of course, the Realm of Elemental Fire, for example). If a Cabalist ever had a serious conversation with one of the elders of Shadowrun, and found out what's beyond the metaplanes, they'd probably be very nervous. Insect spirits and Horrors probably sound a lot like qlippoth to a Cabalist. Qlippoth that arrive and devastate the world on a schedule. :-)

Originally Posted by walkir

Well, it's not quite straight-up 9, too, as wards, sold formulas, watcher spirits, and plants/bacteria against astrally projecting awakeneds aren't normal tech.

True, but that's more technology applied to changing magic, rather than vice versa. We don't see any powerplants run by mages sustaining a giant Flamethrower spell, or riding-wyverns replacing the common car, for example. That's what TL 8+1 would be - familiar tasks, but done a different way using magic.

Originally Posted by walkir

That was more about the SINs - imagine coming into a city of 2071, trying to be undercover... and being stopped by the very first surveillance drone because you did not broadcast your SIN.

Though there are clearly ways around that. Shadowrunners get by, obviously. :-)
Actually, a runner team would make an excellent cover story for a militantly-minded Patrol team. They have a perfect excuse to be secretive, be places they shouldn't, and have strange powers that don't seem normal. Although don't let the guy with psionic Warp get caught by somebody - any one in SR would tear him apart down to the cells to get the secret of true teleportation.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by redwulfe

Would this mean the point of devergence happened 2070 years in the past.

Once the analysts get a real look at the real history of Shadowrun, they're going to simply put the divergence at "A long, long time ago". Once they knew what to look for, there should be ample evidence of no previous age of magic comparable to Shadowrun's in history, which means that the divergence is at least 12,000 years ago, and probably much further.

Originally Posted by redwulfe

From what some people have said is that no world in the infinate Worlds setting are in the future of homelines setting.

It's an important plot point, in fact. There are only two other worlds that Homeline knows about that are at exactly the same point in history as them. One of them is the only other timeline where most of the timeline-jumping technology works properly, Homeline's great rival, Centrum. With the other one, Homeline is scared spitless that the technology is possible there, and just hasn't be developed yet.

Originally Posted by redwulfe

This was cercumvented in Stargate by saying that some civilisations did not have a dark ages and continued a constant stream of advancement and that is why there are technologically superior humans even though all humans came from earth.

Homeline does know of several timelines with more advanced technology. They are, as you suggest, places where the scientific revolution came early, for a variety of reasons, putting higher tech earlier in history.
Although, to be honest, the "dark ages never happened" bit from Stargate is a bit silly. The Dark Ages weren't all that dark, and very little technology was actually lost. In fact, since they really only affected Europe, and the rest of the world continued on its merry, undarkened way, really no technology was lost. The Dark Ages in Europe were characterized by a breakdown of central authority, which meant that big, capital-intensive uses of technology, like aqueducts and huge public baths, and major cities, were hard or impossible to create. Of course, those are the big, sexy uses of technology, so early modern historians just looked at that, and characterized the whole era as reduced from the Roman Empire.

[Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

The Dark Ages weren't all that dark, and very little technology was actually lost. In fact, since they really only affected Europe, and the rest of the world continued on its merry, undarkened way, really no technology was lost. The Dark Ages in Europe were characterized by a breakdown of central authority, which meant that big, capital-intensive uses of technology, like aqueducts and huge public baths, and major cities, were hard or impossible to create. Of course, those are the big, sexy uses of technology, so early modern historians just looked at that, and characterized the whole era as reduced from the Roman Empire.

Even GURPS acknoledges this - the Roman Empire is TL2, while the European Dark Ages is TL3. Technology was more advanced (a brace of plate-armored medieval knights vs their equestrian counterparts in the Roman Legions would be a massacre), but lacked the resources for what Kelly calls the "big, sexy uses".

Shadowrun-Earth might be considered TL7+2, as their applications of conventional technology began to diverge around the beginning of the century. With decades of research on other (not magical) lines, Homeline tech and Shadowrun tech would be incompatible on a lot of levels, probably requiring an engineer to take a new specialty to work with it.

[roguebfl]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

The Dark Ages weren't all that dark, and very little technology was actually lost. In fact, since they really only affected Europe, and the rest of the world continued on its merry, undarkened way, really no technology was lost. The Dark Ages in Europe were characterized by a breakdown of central authority, which meant that big, capital-intensive uses of technology, like aqueducts and huge public baths, and major cities, were hard or impossible to create. Of course, those are the big, sexy uses of technology, so early modern historians just looked at that, and characterized the whole era as reduced from the Roman Empire.

Actually a good deal was lost with the burning of alexanderia libary. and one Tech that was "lost" was medical tech, epically surgical, archeology has unearth Roman surgical tools that were only reinvented in the 20th Century.

But that was not the point about the Dark age.. yes material sciences did advance, but while theoretical was not so much lost but was suppressed

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2

Shadowrun-Earth might be considered TL7+2, as their applications of conventional technology began to diverge around the beginning of the century.

Don't forget, TL 8 is now the "modern" TL. We're living in TL 8 as we speak. So SR is, at worst, TL 8+1. Even so, I'm not really seeing a "divergence", as such. I can't really think of any real technological developments that the real world has that SR doesn't. Rather, what is has are a number of superscience developments, like monowire and non-intrusive neural interfaces, that have been added on to the regular tech. I'd call it TL 9^.