Cypress : Well wrong actually it's hard to explain but any fairy who can change size wil not have a "real" size between the two.. Her current one is her real. Simply, most prefer to go around small to have more room to fly ^^

ahh ok Xp

guess my mind ran away with me ^^;

Kinda like asking what the real look of a shapeshifter is, right? Perhaps the trait has been part of their bloodline for so long, it now is more of a definition of the species, rather than an extra.

Well, I'm certainly glad to know my thread has caught a lot of attention while I was gone.

Well, it was something that I had intended to discuss, myself, if I ever got to it. I'm sure that goes for others, too.

Personally, I subscribe to the dimensional magic theory, like Gregole and Cypress. It just makes the most sense, and is internally consistent with what we've seen and been told so far. Heck, even Karbo said:

Karbo wrote:

Cypress : Well wrong actually it's hard to explain but any fairy who can change size wil not have a "real" size between the two.. Her current one is her real. Simply, most prefer to go around small to have more room to fly ^^

This in no way contradicts the dimensional magic theory, and in fact is evidence to support it. I think I understand what Karbo means- If I get this wrong, please let me know, Karbo! - If I am correct, then the concept of "size" simply does not exist for Fairies the way we recognize it. A fairy does not actually change their physical size, ever. As Gregole said, they simply have the ability to change their size in relation to everything else. I'll call this ability "Dimensional Scaling" for now.

This means that at any and every given moment, if you asked a fairy (we will assume that she will actually try to answer the question instead of eating you) the question, "What is your real size?", the response would always be the same. She might be a bit confused, and not quite sure what you mean at first, but once she got the gist of what you were asking... her answer would be, "This is my real size."

Now, if she suddenly went from 6 inches tall to 60 feet tall right before your eyes one second later, and you asked the question again... the answer would still be "This is my real size." Despite the fact that from your perspective she obviously changed size, from her perspective, the assertion that her current size is her "real size" indicates that from her perspective, no physical change of size occured.

I believe that the concept of physical size as we understand it is not only completely alien to fairies, but totally irrelevant to them. I believe that when a fairy "changes size", they do not think in terms of, "I want to be 80 feet tall.", they think in terms of "I want to be bigger/smaller than that thing there."

As far as the external world is concerned, it treats the fairy as though she has not changed size at all, which is why a fairy will never collapse under her own weight as a result of "growing", and can fly regardless of how tremendous she grows. As far as gravity and aerodynamics are concerned, the fairy is still her "original" diminutive size. It would be very interesting to observe a 95-foot tall fairy out flying on a windy day.

So far, what we do know (as directly stated by Karbo) about fairies works as evidence to support this "dimensional magic" theory:

1) The magical capacity of a fairy's body does not increase when she "gets bigger".
2) A fairy's "real" size is whatever her current size is.
3) Most fairies are small only because they like having more space, not because "small" is their default size!
4) (Not 100% certain on this one) A fairy's ability to shrink another creature has limits; (I don't believe Karbo ever definitively stated what those limits are, but I do remember him saying to that effect. Can anyone verify?)

What really clenches it for me is if a fairy can "change size" after eating someone, or while pregnant; so far, all signs point to the answer being "Yes", but I would really like Karbo to confirm that. If a fairy can swallow someone, and then "shrink" to 3 inches tall, and there is still no size discrepancy at all between the inside of the fairy's stomach and the person inside of it... then logically, one of two things is happening.

A) Either the fairy automatically changes the size of her meal while it is in her stomach so that it is always consistent with her external size (Example: If a fairy gets bigger, the inside of her stomach doesn't suddenly become a giant cavern to the person in it. If she get smaller, you don't suddenly see a "way too big" human exploding out of a "way too small" fairy.), which defies rational explanation to the point that the best explanation would be "It's magic!".

B) The fairy is never actually physically changing size. Therefore, the size of her stomach always remains the same in relation to the size of anything inside her stomach. If she eats until she gets full, and then gets bigger... she is still full. She does not become less full, because the amount of space the food in her stomach occupies never actually decreases (at least, not until it has been digested). If she is full and gets smaller, then her stomach does not burst because it is suddenly "too small to hold the amount of food inside of it". A fairy never changes her physical size, only her size in relation to the world around her.

At least, that seems to be the theory that best explains what we can "observe" (in a fictional context, anyways), and the one I prefer. I hope I did a decent job explaining it, someone else can feel free to hop in and clarify parts I might have been vague on.

_________________
"Common Sense tells us, 'If it isn't broken, don't fix it!'."
"Scientific Method tells us, 'If it isn't broken, break it and figure out how it works!'."
"Quantum Mechanics tells us, 'If it can be fixed, it isn't really broken!'."

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Thanks, Malahite! Hmm... Yeah, taken out of context, that is vague enough that you can't really extrapolate limits from it. There are just too many ways you could take that.

But still...

You know, I never gave fairies all that much thought up until now. Just another magic giant (sometimes) predator, on a world full of them, right? After reading over what has been discussed in this topic, as well as things Karbo has said in other threads and the wiki, and really considering the implications, I realized something.

Regardless of their power, (Felaryan) Fairies are potentially the most dangerous species on Felarya, hands down. Seriously. Forget demons, dridders, nagas, and anything else living on the surface of Felarya; the only thing keeping Fairies from being the alpha species on Felarya is their mindset.

Destroy the Scaries- er, Fairies!

Thing is, eventually they likely will drive away a good deal of species. Unlike a good bunch of other 'Predators', they take to literature and recording of history. This doesn't sound like much, until one realizes that this means that they will be a 'Predator' species that likely will begin to develop technologically as well. And if so, nothing will be scarier than if they can begin to steal and reverse engineer others tech and will have the production capabilities to mass-produce it.

Their hedonistic lifestyle is likely what keeps us safe, as you said. That goes away, shit hits the fan and people of all species better hope their mages are up to the challenge.

Once again some very interesting thoughts here !!

Wow now you got me thinking in depths to fairy magic. I am not sure how to pull it yet but I think it would be very worth making an entry about that in the wiki