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Mel Mudkiper posted:BTW why do fantasy novels always fail to have fantasy settings. BTW why do you not kill yourself instead of bitching in every thread from football to books? (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Jun 11, 2018 05:07
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Sham bam bamina! posted:Let's assume that we do have a desert full of porcelain-white humans and that the reason is because there's no UV radiation in sunlight. What does a world without UV radiation even look like, and why does it still have humans? And if it looks the same, then you're changing a fundamental quality of the universe for no reason except to contrive the most trivial of cosmetic details. It's idiocy either way. This is dumb as poo poo. Real world desert dwellers are not all deep black. The famous Sahara Bedouins are mostly of Arabic descent and as such a lot lighter than most sub-Saharan Africans. Many people living in and around the Mojave desert in the USA are quite white. If for some reason your fantasy desert dwellers have only lily white pseudo-European ancestors, reaching just medieval tech levels (not to mention any magic they may possess) would likely be enough to avoid evolutionary pressure that would turn them much darker. Not to mention that it matters how long ago your fantasy whites settled the desert. Lactose tolerance is a mutation about 7000 years old and has spread to a significant share of the world population, and geneticists are still amazed how incredibly fast it spread. If the fantasy desert was settled "just" a thousand years ago, then that's not very long in evolutionary timetables (for humans). That said, if not only your (noble) desert people but also the rest of the main nations are filled with whites, while the non-whites are in far away countries and/or are the villains, then it's no question it's racist.
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Jun 11, 2018 05:32
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Torrannor posted:This is dumb as poo poo. Real world desert dwellers are not all deep black. The famous Sahara Bedouins are mostly of Arabic descent and as such a lot lighter than most sub-Saharan Africans. Many people living in and around the Mojave desert in the USA are quite white. If for some reason your fantasy desert dwellers have only lily white pseudo-European ancestors, reaching just medieval tech levels (not to mention any magic they may possess) would likely be enough to avoid evolutionary pressure that would turn them much darker. Not to mention that it matters how long ago your fantasy whites settled the desert. Lactose tolerance is a mutation about 7000 years old and has spread to a significant share of the world population, and geneticists are still amazed how incredibly fast it spread. If the fantasy desert was settled "just" a thousand years ago, then that's not very long in evolutionary timetables (for humans). Sham bam bamina! posted:I'm not saying that you can't have a desert full of white people. I'm saying that you can't pretend that ad-hoc justifications for it won't be stupid. Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 06:17 on Jun 11, 2018 |
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Jun 11, 2018 06:12
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Sham bam bamina! posted:You're proving my point. These are all real-world cases, not the arbitrary rule-breaking that I was talking about. Maybe I should have been clearer and said "ad-hoc justifications like these" or something, but there's a chasm of difference between saying, "These desert-dwellers have light skin because they settled recently," and "These desert-dwellers have light skin because... uh... magic makes the color black work different." That's all I was getting at. (Also, I specifically used "porcelain-white" as my example because, no matter how white someone can get, they're going to tan if they live in the desert unless they're constantly indoors or otherwise protected.) Oh, I've misread you. Yeah, you are right about that. One thing I love about Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive is that you can get halfway through the first book, until they describe the look of the Shin people. Who have unusually light skin color and unnaturally round eyes... and you realize that every main character except Szeth (he's Shin) is Asian 
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Jun 11, 2018 06:31
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Torrannor posted:One thing I love about Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive is that you can get halfway through the first book, until they describe the look of the Shin people. Who have unusually light skin color and unnaturally round eyes... and you realize that every main character except Szeth (he's Shin) is Asian Why not simply read East Asian literature instead of genre garbage?
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Jun 11, 2018 09:39
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My fav east asian literature is saint young men. Whats yours?
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Jun 11, 2018 10:25
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That one about a guy reincarnating in an RPG world, you know the one.
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Jun 11, 2018 10:29
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:Why not simply read East Asian literature instead of genre garbage? I'm reading the Naruto manga (now with his son), does that count?
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Jun 11, 2018 10:33
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:That one about a guy reincarnating in an RPG world, you know the one. Ah, Toaru Ossan no VRMMO Katsudouki, a true classic. Very good choice my dude
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Jun 11, 2018 10:34
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Sham bam bamina! posted:There's no reason to arbitrarily change basic, obvious facts about how the world works if you aren't radically altering the whole fabric of natural laws and wave the discrepancies away with "magic" when magic somehow leaves everything else alone. The reason is that its fantasy. Fantasy is not beholden to reason or to cause and effect. Why should fantasy be beholden to anything? Magic by definition is irrational, why expect it to have clearly understood cause and effect? ulmont posted:BTW why do you not kill yourself instead of bitching in every thread from football to books? Jokes on you I already killed myself years ago and my angry ghost haunts the forum
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Jun 11, 2018 12:26
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Mel Mudkiper posted:The reason is that its fantasy. "Magic by definition is irrational, why expect it to have clearly understood cause and effect?" is a strange thing to say when your entire post was about desperately contrived causes and effects. Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 23:22 on Jun 11, 2018 |
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Jun 11, 2018 23:09
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Edit: never mind, I'm too short on time to give this post its due.
Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 23:32 on Jun 11, 2018 |
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Jun 11, 2018 23:28
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Mel Mudkiper posted:The reason is that its fantasy. Magic can be irrational or it can be a source of fictional power which is explained in-universe. Its fictional. You can have it be whatever you want. Fantasy without cause and effect would not lead to a dramatically satisfying story, at least not for most people. Sure you can write fantasy that doesn't need to be logical. It can be a lyrical journey through a nonsensical world and those kind of stories exist but I find them tiresome.
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Jun 11, 2018 23:38
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Ccs posted:Magic can be irrational or it can be a source of fictional power which is explained in-universe. Its fictional. You can have it be whatever you want. Isn't this basically Finnegan's Wake?
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Jun 11, 2018 23:58
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Ccs posted:Magic can be irrational or it can be a source of fictional power which is explained in-universe. Its fictional. You can have it be whatever you want. If its explainable and rational it's not magic, just a different law of physics
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Jun 12, 2018 00:23
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Sham bam bamina! posted:You're trying to have it both ways, for reasons beyond me. If you want something strange and fantastical that doesn't play by any rules, fine. If you go back and try to justify it with asinine new ones, you're shooting yourself in the foot, sawing it off, and eating it. Imagine someone putting a brilliant red pine tree in a story because they like the image and aren't beholden to the pines of our world, then hastily assuring the reader, "No, no, no, it's OK - magic causes chlorophyll to reflect a different wavelength with this species of tree!" Who the hell thinks like that? Fair enough, I wasnt explicitly trying to argue there should be an explanation for why white people are in a desert, just that any explanation in fantasy would be fundamentally arbitrary because its fantasy, so why stick to the rational
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Jun 12, 2018 00:25
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Mel Mudkiper posted:If its explainable and rational it's not magic, just a different law of physics Depends on the setting.
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Jun 12, 2018 00:43
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:That one about a guy reincarnating in an RPG world, you know the one. Is Final Fantasy 10 literature now?
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Jun 12, 2018 00:43
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Reene posted:Depends on the setting. Not really If magic is rational it is mundane. Why aspire to the mystical if you only want to bring it down to earth?
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Jun 12, 2018 00:45
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My extremely hot fantasy take is that fantasy should be more religious/spiritual. More ineffable mysticism, deliberate paradox, and unknowable mystery, less “if the wizard waves the staff with his right hand and makes the proper gesture with his left he can cast a level 3 fireball.”
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Jun 12, 2018 01:39
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Fair enough, I wasnt explicitly trying to argue there should be an explanation for why white people are in a desert, just that any explanation in fantasy would be fundamentally arbitrary because its fantasy, so why stick to the rational Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 01:49 on Jun 12, 2018 |
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Jun 12, 2018 01:43
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Chuck Buried Treasure posted:My extremely hot fantasy take is that fantasy should be more religious/spiritual. More ineffable mysticism, deliberate paradox, and unknowable mystery, less “if the wizard waves the staff with his right hand and makes the proper gesture with his left he can cast a level 3 fireball.” Ahhh, like Prince of Thorns.
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Jun 12, 2018 03:20
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Sham bam bamina! posted:That's a false distinction. All explanations are rational by definition. It is better to not use a grossly contrived explanation because your story will not have a gross contrivance in it. It is acceptable to use an explanation at all because with any story, a series of causally linked events, a modicum of logic is inherently part of its world. I disagree. One of the things I admire about religion and mythology is the total abandonment of pretense of rationality as it seeks to exalt the define. Why can Zeus turn into a golden rainfall and impregnate a woman? Because he is a god and he can. There is no rationalization, no rules, no coherence or precedent. It is an action wholly mysterious and outside of our understanding of causation. It is frustrated that most fantasy writers cannot lift themselves to that level of imagination. Chuck Buried Treasure posted:My extremely hot fantasy take is that fantasy should be more religious/spiritual. More ineffable mysticism, deliberate paradox, and unknowable mystery, less “if the wizard waves the staff with his right hand and makes the proper gesture with his left he can cast a level 3 fireball.” Yeah, that's kind of my feeling. Magic should exist somewhere between superstition and reproducible science. If it can be controlled and understood, it is physics. If it is wholly unconquerable, it is phenomenon. Magic should be written as a force outside of complete understanding and control, but well enough known that it might be guided to behave in certain ways by one wise enough. Mel Mudkiper fucked around with this message at 04:10 on Jun 12, 2018 |
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Jun 12, 2018 04:05
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A decade ago I realized that magic wasn't even a small part of the reason I like fantasy, and in bad fantasy books like Name you can eliminate it entirely without affecting the plot.
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Jun 12, 2018 04:36
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Not really Okay, let me rephrase: it's cool that you prefer to see magic and mysticism written in a certain way but that is not the only way to write it and pulling some No True Wizard poo poo does not make your position the one true way to do the thing.
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Jun 12, 2018 05:50
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Mel Mudkiper posted:I disagree. One of the things I admire about religion and mythology is the total abandonment of pretense of rationality as it seeks to exalt the define. Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 06:32 on Jun 12, 2018 |
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Jun 12, 2018 06:11
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Reene posted:Okay, let me rephrase: it's cool that you prefer to see magic and mysticism written in a certain way but that is not the only way to write it and pulling some No True Wizard poo poo does not make your position the one true way to do the thing. How is rational magic not a mundane, scientific thing tho? It's okay to enjoy or even prefer it but I don't think that was really the question...?
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Jun 12, 2018 06:33
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He's saying it's not magic at all, period, regardless of how it's regarded and written in the setting, but rather some kind of Advanced Physics thing. I can think of like, several books off the top of my head where this definitely isn't the case in-setting. Even real-life "magical" traditions you'll find really methodical bullshit.
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Jun 12, 2018 07:29
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I'm happy with Rothfuss, I'm happy with my life
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Jun 12, 2018 11:07
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Mel Mudkiper posted:I disagree. One of the things I admire about religion and mythology is the total abandonment of pretense of rationality as it seeks to exalt the define. This is a super premodern view of mythology, anthropology since Frazer has been tracing the reasonings of cause & effect that underlie primitive systems of magic and myth. Someone didnt just wake up one day and say "oh poo poo maybe zeus can turn into whatever the gently caress", there was some thing or things that needed to be explained and they attempted to explain it. The fact they started from a false axiom like "things that look similar have similar properties" or "touching something imbues part of its essence into you" doesnt mean theres no reasoning or rationality
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Jun 12, 2018 11:31
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The problem is that, as presented, the characters wrangling out a scientific method of magic is not funny at all.
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Jun 12, 2018 11:38
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:I'm happy with Rothfuss, I'm happy with my life Two wrongs don’t make a right.
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Jun 12, 2018 12:17
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Torrannor posted:Oh, I've misread you. Yeah, you are right about that. It's not that the Shin are Caucasian (and the rest of the races aren't all Asian-based, just some of them), it's that they're pale-skinned with big  eyes.The Veden are Caucasian (and all redheads, iirc) though. 
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Jun 12, 2018 13:42
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Taking the mysticism out of magic is certainly an exercise in futility, it renders it to formulas and the scientific method. There's probably a way to render these things as interesting and beautiful in their own right, as I'm sure math majors have a deep appreciation for numbers that not many people would otherwise have, but just doing the DnD "therefore and then" just makes it dry and uninteresting. Lack of imagination is a perpetual problem in genre fiction though.
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Jun 12, 2018 17:55
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HIJK posted:Taking the mysticism out of magic is certainly an exercise in futility, it renders it to formulas and the scientific method. There's probably a way to render these things as interesting and beautiful in their own right, as I'm sure math majors have a deep appreciation for numbers that not many people would otherwise have, but just doing the DnD "therefore and then" just makes it dry and uninteresting. This
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Jun 12, 2018 17:58
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If the word "magic" is used more than once or twice in a hundred page span, you're probably dealing with the wrong kind of magic.
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Jun 12, 2018 18:10
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Hot take - magic should be magical
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Jun 12, 2018 19:18
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my bony fealty posted:Hot take - magic should be magical Hotter take - the specifics of magic only matter to the extent they undermine or reinforce the dramatic mechanics of the rest of the story
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Jun 12, 2018 20:52
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hottest take all magic should be magical realism
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Jun 12, 2018 21:03
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Mel Mudkiper posted:If its explainable and rational it's not magic, just a different law of physics Okay then most fantasy magic ever is just physics. HIJK posted:Isn't this basically Finnegan's Wake? Maybe, but most people don't enjoy or are even able to comprehend Finnegan's Wake.
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Jun 12, 2018 22:18
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