But what of Earth?

(If you get that joke, you're made of win.)

Anywho. This thread was made because I have looked all over this forum, even using the search and talking to members, and still not got ONE straight answer I find satisfactory as to why Earth isn't allowed to be Homeworld/Origin World for Felaryan made OCs. So can somebody please explain to me why Karbo/the site decided to ban Earth?...And don't tell me it was Vulgons.

Generally speaking, worlds that are already canon in other media, or in general, like lord of the rings, star wars, call of duty, any characters brought in from those worlds are frowned upon. One problem is because everyone wants their characters canonized, if they're not, they're kidding themselves (regardless of their goal just to be a better writer or what-have-you). So, one cannot get their OC canonized if they are from another world, which includes Earth. It's not prohibited to do these things, but it lacks creativity when one does this.

Also as far as the reason for Earth goes, its because Earth has not magic capabilities. On magic-poor worlds, the ability to connect dimensionally to Felarya is extremely rare, and weak. It is basically unheard of. This is the general rule of thumb as to why worlds can or cannot connect (except for having a dimensional gateway) to Felarya.

However, if this does happen, say you, the reader, personally wind up somehow in a vanishing land and are whisked away into Felarya during your next run through the park next Sunday, you'd be trapped in Felarya with absolutely no way back whatsoever, because even if you try world-hopping through the dimensional rifts and portals, the likelihood of reaching Earth again...is equivalent to every single world that exists in the multiverse, combined with the percentage of likely worlds to land on depending on how magic-rich they are.

Make sense? Any further questions?

tl;dr: remember kids, its just not gonna happen.

Indeed, I don't see much point in creating a fictional universe if you're only going to put earth characters in it. Make Earth canon and then everyone is going to make it about earth. Heck, many writers still do it dispite it going against canon

There's also the fact that opening Felarya to Earth opens the setting to becoming a medium through which people express their opinions and views (i.o.w. flaming) about ideals, politics, etc. which I think is also something Karbo wanted to avoid. Opening Felarya to other canon worlds can have the same effect with respect to opinions about those franchises.

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Generally speaking, worlds that are already canon in other media, or in general, like lord of the rings, star wars, call of duty, any characters brought in from those worlds are frowned upon.

Those I see...sorta. I believe everyone should have one joke OC. You can always "Ascended Fan Ficatize" them like I did with David and Katia. Helps to build better OCs down the road and build off/ spin off their previous skills and equips. Such as Dave being a Psion and using a enchanted blade rather than his lightsaber and the force.

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One problem is because everyone wants their characters canonized, if they're not, they're kidding themselves

Well my main OCs yeah. Clare and Kate and maybe Tam, but some OCs like Anthony are just there because I want a male naga to fill in a slot and be a friend to Clare. He might get a mention in her bio if she ever had one on the wiki but I'd faint if he got a bio there. He's not as interesting or well put together and I know he'll never end up there. So I don't agree with this 100% but I do see what you're saying.

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So, one cannot get their OC canonized if they are from another world, which includes Earth.

...You are kidding right? A load of already cannon characters are from offworld! Leppy, Lord Gramon, Lea', Jora, Elle, Isham, Jade, Katrika. I could go one but with eight OCs named who have been canonized I'm sure I made my point.

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However, if this does happen, say you, the reader, personally wind up somehow in a vanishing land and are whisked away into Felarya during your next run through the park next Sunday, you'd be trapped in Felarya with absolutely no way back whatsoever, because even if you try world-hopping through the dimensional rifts and portals, the likelihood of reaching Earth again...is equivalent to every single world that exists in the multi-verse, combined with the percentage of likely worlds to land on depending on how magic-rich they are.

Fascinating reading material there, Bael. I have long sought such an answer for why OCs I had from Earth-look-a-likes couldn't just go home when RPing and that would do it. o.O Thanks for that bit! It'll save me having to double curse Kate. ^_^

jedi-explorer wrote:

...You are kidding right? A load of already cannon characters are from offworld! Leppy, Lord Gramon, Lea', Jora, Elle, Isham, Jade, Katrika. I could go one but with eight OCs named who have been canonized I'm sure I made my point.

I think Bael means worlds that arn't considered part of the Felarya universe. As in worlds that are not unique to the Felarya storyline.

Just because Felarya can get connected to other worlds doesn't mean that it should be canon that it can connect to every world fictional or otherwise. The gateways are there so a story teller can introduce characters into Felarya that arn't familar with the setting, it's not there so we can create universe cross overs that will just be a headache in the long run because no two universes ever work to the same rules.

and really who wants Glitterboys, Guyver units, Veratechs, or Jedai in Felarya (Glitterboys are from Rifts and have a "boom gun" that could kill giant preds)

*raises hand* Jedi+Felarya would be epic. OwO

yes yes and I have joked around with the idea of a Gensokyo/Felarya cross over too, but is it a good idea? probably not.

I thought there was also an element of preventing self-insert OCs littering the Felaryan landscape behind the decision? I know it's inevitable people do draw upon aspects of themselves when creating characters, but opening up Earth as a viable homeworld option makes the option of abandoning all imagination and writing yourself into a story for the realisation of some fantasy all too easy. Sort of boosts creativity out of necessity!

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and really who wants Glitterboys, Guyver units, Veratechs, or Jedai

I recognized only one of those and I'm a major sci-fi/fantasy nut ...or so I thought. o.O Also nice use of the Ancient word for Jedi, but you could have done one better. Jed'aii. The first Jedi. Or Better known as a The Followers of the Ashla.

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*raises hand* Jedi+Felarya would be epic. OwO

XD Too epic I'm afraid as my Walfas comic will show once I get back to work on it. Besides we have Psions and they are almost the same. Just no rival evil orders, laser weapons and one guiding super powerful thing to draw on to boost themselves cheaply when they need it.

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es yes and I have joked around with the idea of a Gensokyo/Felarya cross over too, but is it a good idea? probably not.

For a game yes. For RP or Story? No way!! Felarya is already filled with gigantic super battles as it is and it's not even designed for it. I hate to think what it'd be like as a bullet hell riden- *Has idea for a epic pic*. Then again maybe...<.<

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I thought there was also an element of preventing self-insert OCs littering the Felaryan landscape behind the decision? I know it's inevitable people do draw upon aspects of themselves when creating characters, but opening up Earth as a viable homeworld option makes the option of abandoning all imagination and writing yourself into a story for the realisation of some fantasy all too easy. Sort of boosts creativity out of necessity!

That's a valid argument. I suppose the world would be better without a ton of self inserts, but honestly trying to fight against it is dumb. When you've been on the internet a long time and you're creative your going to make "reps" or self inserts and most of the time they will bear your user name or real name or some variation of both. It's just the way it works. Much like skit/ fan inserts I think everyone is entitled to one. Hence I have Dave and Axel is based of a former self insert to make fun of the fact my MSN was axelhearltess but my name was Dave so everyone kept calling me Axel and I made a new joke self insert. I later used him in Felarya as a attempt to get into Nikita's spidery pants and when that didn't work out I started to work with him more seriously as a member of the Spetz and soon wrote a much better storyline for him and got my first Psion and where was Axel from? An Earth-like world that was more of a Cyber Punk twin to Earth. Earth is a the base template for all planets and worlds. It's an inevitable. I used to HATE Earth as a setting for a world. I uysed Alter Earths for a long time and even totally different environments for Earth-like planets with more landscape, but eventually a author friend made me see that it was all Earth really. Cause that's where I live and drawn inspiration from.....Till Star Freighters become commercialized...

Another aspect that's nearly impossible to write out is the culture. You see Earth culture in Felarya all the time. T-shirts, Backpacks, Samurai Armor and so on. How do you explain that away? Invent dozen near Earths with similar culture or just not explain it at all?

jedi-explorer wrote:

Another aspect that's nearly impossible to write out is the culture. You see Earth culture in Felarya all the time. T-shirts, Backpacks, Samurai Armor and so on. How do you explain that away? Invent dozen near Earths with similar culture or just not explain it at all?

Well from what I've been told, any simularies to earth is surposed to be coincidental and have their own developmental history from their respective worlds completely independant from Earth.

Jedai was me misspelling and not double checking.

A Verithech is a form of transformable flying mech from the Macross/Robotech series, they are famous for their cluster missiles. The Refex or Synchro weapons would also be bad.

A Guyver unit is an old and some what famous anime, its a biological armor system that grafts onto a human and turns them into weapons of mass destruction, a few of these could rapidly alter the Felaryan landscape. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bio_Booster_Armor_Guyver

As for Glitterboys, they were a smaller mech used in the Rifts Universe, noted for its tough mirror like armor and its "Boom Gun". Rifts Earth has some resemblance to Felayra, for example it is a magic rich dimensional nexus (cause by the apocalypses). In a system where the average riffle has about as much power as a modern tank the "Boom Gun" would be sufficient to make a Glitterboy a walking nightmare in Felarya.

Here's my question on the subject: why does magic have to be the deciding factor in whether a world can link to Felarya?
Is it impossible for a scientifically-advanced species to reach Felarya without magic, or could they construct a dimensional gate analogue running on 'science' instead of 'magic'? Given Felarya's status as a dimensional nexus of sorts, I'd think it would be quite an easy jump from the creation of a dimensional gate to reaching Felarya: like finding a major city from space due to all the lights.

If scientific (well, pseudoscientific) means of dimension-hopping were allowed, what would stop someone from 'Earth' 256 reaching Felarya?

I second Zephyr's curiosity. I guess I kind of assumed at first that it was possible for any civilization in any universe to make a portal to Felarya as long as they had the means, magical, technological, or otherwise.
I sure hope I'm not wrong because if I am then I have no idea how Persephone ended up here

I usually solve my problem by delving into both. When I have a character from Earth, I usually put them into personal fanfics that I don't want canonized. Then I take all my creativity and put out some brand new characters that come from scratch.

My favorite part is making robots that are completely original. Or as original as I can try.

Zephyr102 wrote:

Here's my question on the subject: why does magic have to be the deciding factor in whether a world can link to Felarya?
Is it impossible for a scientifically-advanced species to reach Felarya without magic, or could they construct a dimensional gate analogue running on 'science' instead of 'magic'? Given Felarya's status as a dimensional nexus of sorts, I'd think it would be quite an easy jump from the creation of a dimensional gate to reaching Felarya: like finding a major city from space due to all the lights.

If scientific (well, pseudoscientific) means of dimension-hopping were allowed, what would stop someone from 'Earth' 256 reaching Felarya?

Perhaps the fact that Earth' 256 doesn't exist in the Felarya universe?

I shall repeat myself, Just because there is a gateway that allows travel to other worlds, doesn't mean that all Canonical universes exist in the narrative, that way madness lies. There's no way you can make a believeable universe where anything from Super Sayains to the Fraggles could end up in Felarya if given the right circumstances

yeah, the simple reason is that just because you like say Star Treck and Felarya, doesn't mean you should mix the two.

Look, to be straight with you, if you want to plug someone from Earth into Felarya, you can. Artistdragon on dA for instance managed to plug some Victorian British milquetoasts in there. I just wish they were hardcore twits, like in Monty Python. AzureJass also had a British fetish [it's funny because it rhymes].

MukatKiKaarn also plugged a very nice guy, Ibrahim Saunders, out of his cab and into Felarya, and it worked just peachy despite containing explicit Islam.

Frenchsnack also plugged some college chumps straight into Milly, in story 8 or 11, one of those two, I think. And they died. Krisexy26 was writing a story with a ship full of people... and guess what, I bet they're going to die in droves.

I'm assuming that Earth doesn't have any noticeable impact in Felarya as a whole to require any sort of canon acknowledgement as to its existence; personally, I prefer avoiding Earth connections because it's 2063 AU in Felarya, and 90% of people will link to 2063 AU whether they're Victorian London twits, Chicago Muslim Cab drivers... or fucking plesiosaurs (like with Jasconius).

Since we assume most people can return to their own world through a portal, that brings up a wholly different can o' worms for the attentive reader: say we put Ibrahim Saunders and some brits in a boat together with some Spetsnaz cold war ops, then kick the boat through a portal: do they all return to their own years, to the same year, to the average of the years? To the post-apocalyptic future? To the Stone Age? To the current year corresponding to 2063? And what about the boat? Sure, I like opening cans o' worms in people's brain, but in this case everyone beat me to it- by accident!



So in short I prefer not linking to Earth 'cause I'm not sure what year 2063 would correspond to.

P.S: Also, people get to correct me if I get stuff wrong about their country or religion rather than help me build.

i think the presence of humans and other earth animal forms is enough reference to this planet were all stuck on. Just having humans there gives us a sort of impression that earth will exist does exist or did exist sometime in connection with this world, but prevents any of our historical or contemporary events from touching it and gives a sort of "Once upon a time" idea to it, i find the term quite weighted in connection with certain types of stories, but as a phrase it entails that we have no idea if we are being placed in future, past or present of our current sense of our world. and i find that ambiguity quite freeing.


specifically i found i like that earth isn't mentioned for two reasons.

#1. it gives us more freedom to root for whatever species without a preset "home team" Karbos method in the manga that allows me to see things primarily from the predators point of view most of the time, while the humans in the story remain more of a mystery to a certain extent although they do have their scenes, or simply a tasty treat. in the end i still feel that it leans toward being the predators story

Its really a clever set up considering that most stories out there , even when we are made to feel sympathetic for other creatures, humans still come out to be the focus.

Lord of the rings- human hero
Avatar- human hero
star wars - human centered

so on and so on, its usually us defeating the aliens/ other races, or saving them or what have you.

E.T - almost broke this trope because of the interdependency factor between the two main characters. this was probably the reason for its success as the audience would sense that there was something new and different happening narrative wise

Shrek sort of attempted it as well.

there's others to prove the rarity of what Felarya has, but i'm just using the big ones

Edit: oh my... i bypassed the talking animal/ talking object entirely genre, these usually fit into two categories. ones where the animals are simply a visual device to tell a story, standing in for types of people and humans are entirely absent, like Shark Tale. Or secondly humans are a more distant plot device or Over-lording Presence (Toy Story, Bambi, Once Upon a Forest, Ice Age 1).


I don't want to trail too much into a discussion on these, the point i was going for is that its rare that when another creature is both above and a destructive force toward humans like the predators are do we get to see their side of things presented as possibly acceptable their usually evil aliens or dinosaurs or whatever, essentially monsters. therefore we never truly are removed from our position of either centrality or power, save for instances like Felarya.



#2. Agreeing with what has already mentioned before, omitting earth creates a barrier to all of our cultural sensitivities, allowing stories to be told in a more pure way drawing on the raw essence of issues, decontextualizing them from their usual trappings so we can experience them in an unbiased way.

i did enjoy reading French Snack's Lost in Felarya, but it had a different effect on me than other purely Felarya based stories. It didn't give me that out of body experience quite as much as Karbo's depictions, i found that i could place myself easily having so much evidence of real culture intertwined in the story it kept me sort of tied down to my place in reality.

that sort of interaction with reality has its strong points and use. but the isolated universe approach i feel gives much more power to pure creativity.

if there was an earth i would be best to be an unrecognizable one to our own, but i would much more approve of a completely imagined human "homeworld" in order to keep Felarya untied to our sense of time.

well that my reading on it anyhow

Regarding dates, I just go with something akin to C.S. Lewis's excuse and say "it runs on an independent timeline". When you go from Universe X to Felarya at X time, you arrive at Y time. With The Chronicles of Narnia physics, you can leave Felarya at Y+n time and you'll return home at some random time.
IMO, things work a little better if, if you leave Felarya at Y+n time, you get home at X+n time, and vice versa, provided you used a reliable portal. If you didn't, or if it's your first trip... well a stone age caveman and a 221st-century capsuleer could equally likely end up both entering Felarya at 2063 Felarya time. If you use an unstable portal, they could very well end up in each other's times or any other random time when they went home, but if they used a more stable portal such as the Negav gate, there should only be a single point in spacetime at which Felarya and the other universe connect.
At least that's my understanding.

Stabs wrote:

Since we assume most people can return to their own world through a portal, that brings up a wholly different can o' worms for the attentive reader: say we put Ibrahim Saunders and some brits in a boat together with some Spetsnaz cold war ops, then kick the boat through a portal: do they all return to their own years, to the same year, to the average of the years? To the post-apocalyptic future? To the Stone Age? To the current year corresponding to 2063?

I always felt the Dimensional Gate itself was more stable, kinda like a Stargate. People use Felarya as a nexus, getting from one place to another, hence the Felaryan Express traveling between the two main gates. Felarya wouldn't be used like that if traders and other businesspersons couldn't reach their destination with some level of reliability. While I can't speak for the Negavian Dimensional Gate (or any of the possible others) specifically, the Ur-Sagolian Dimensional Gate definitely possesses the required accuracy:

Ur-Sagol Wiki Entry wrote:

Another mystery is how easy it is to use the gate. Merely thinking about where you wish to go is sufficient for the gate to accurately teleport you to your destination gate. Obviously, this makes the ancient and mysterious artifact something of a legend on many worlds, baffling mages and scientists alike, and no one has ever been able to figure out how it works.

So, if you shoved an arrangement of people from unique times and places into the Gate, supposing it is possible for a Dimensional Gate to reach Earth, then they would all arrive when and where they wanted to, supposing there was a viable destination gate in existence at that time and place, which means the most of the characters you mentioned will not be getting back to their time, unless your Alternate Earth had Dimensional Gate technology at the times those characters came from.
I personally believe someone could reach some form of Earth via one of the Gates if the correct technology or magic existed on the Earth they wanted to reach. It would probably not be our Earth or an Earth similar to ours, barring hidden technology or magic in that world.